


I Shut My Eyes and All the World Drops Dead

by Diamantspitzhacke (RedSoleWrites)



Category: Dream SMP - Fandom, Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: :)))), Angst, Family Dynamics, Gen, Horror, I am so very sorry, Sleepy Bois Inc as Family, Swearing, Wilbur Soot and Technoblade and TommyInnit are Siblings, but also not sorry at ALL, i shamelessly disregard canon and create whatever monster this is, if that's not for you please don't hurt yourself trying to read, if your fave dies it's nothing personal, it's just business, just your everyday average 'we got snowed in together' fic, nothing suspicious or sinister at all, so it's their minecraft characters but it's not in minecraft? if that makes sense?, watch out there is a lil bit of gore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-20
Updated: 2021-01-31
Packaged: 2021-03-08 23:20:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 19
Words: 62,699
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27114586
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RedSoleWrites/pseuds/Diamantspitzhacke
Summary: A snowstorm of massive proportions catches our cast off-guard on the mountain they all just so happen to be on at the same time. Stranded, lost, frozen solid, they've got to get to know each other, and quickly, in order to make it through the blizzard.That's definitely all there is to it.Totally.
Comments: 551
Kudos: 453
Collections: Found family to make me feel something, MCYT Fic Rec





	1. Entr'acte

**Author's Note:**

> Hello everybody! Welcome to the fic! I hope you can enjoy my late-night writing! Thanks to my fantastic friends in discord for the ideas, support, and motivation! Love you all!
> 
> Let the show begin!

Frozen and frostbitten fingers clutched at his arms, shivering, as Tommy shoveled his way further up the hill. The snow pulled at his legs with every step, but he pressed forwards. He glanced back at his companions, the rest of the so-named “Sleepy Boys, Incorporated” lumbering behind him. Wilbur was huddled right next to Phil, and Techno was gazing off towards the tree line.

In the beginning, when they’d first started this trek, the group had expected some light snow. It was going to be a fun hike. Maybe they’d get enough snow to have a snowball fight. Tommy had been excited at the prospect of snow during the wintry months. Anything to spice up the whole day of just _walking_.

Right now, though, he was sorely regretting those wishes. The blizzard had appeared from nowhere, sprinting in and practically catapulting snow down at the weary travelers.

Every part of Tommy’s body felt cold. Earlier that day, he’d proclaimed that as a certified Big Strong Man, he wasn’t about to “be a pussy and wear a coat, Wil, come on man.” Of course, this was another mistake of his. Now he was shivering fervently, clothes soaked through and practically refrozen on his body again.

Keeling over to the startled cries of his family, Tommy plunged face-first into the snow. He was so fucking cold. He just wanted to find somewhere warm to take shelter from the storm. But he was lost, Phil was lost, Wil was lost, Techno the ‘Human GPS’ was lost. They had no idea where they were after the blizzard obscured everything. Any landmarks they could have used to navigate further were covered in a thick layer of snow. With the support of his brothers, Tommy made his way to his feet again, Phil worriedly brushing the snow off of his front. The group gathered themselves, bolstered each other, and continued walking further into the snow.

At long last, hope appeared. A massive mansion, which someone had built deep in the middle of the woods for some dumb fucking reason, loomed over them from their limited field of view. _Not the time to shit on their location choice_ , Tommy chided himself, _not when it’s saving our asses_. At least three stories high and built from thick logs and bricks, the house looked ominous and foreboding. There weren’t any lights on inside, every window dark, and deep shadows sprung from the dim lighting and overhanging roof. The wood was a deep brown, the bricks almost black. Half the windows were shuttered, another third’s shutters hung open, and the remainder were practically falling from their hinges. Knife-like icicles jutted from the eaves as if the house itself were threatening them.

In no condition to critique the design choices, though, the exhausted and unsteady group trudged up to the door, knocked, and upon receiving no answer, opened the mysteriously unlocked door and walked inside.

Fundy exchanged worried glances with his friends as their snowmobiles buzzed over the snow. As the only people on this shift, he, Eret, Niki, and their fresh hire Tubbo were the unfortunate ones responsible for ensuring the safety of any visitors to the mountain during the massive blizzard. Still, it was what they’d signed up for, and they would do their jobs with pride.

In the incessant snow, though, it was hard to even see Eret and Tubbo on the other snowmobile at all, much less any possible stranded people. _Ski Patrol really does not have the easy job, huh_. Fundy sighed beneath the mask covering his nose and mouth. _Couldn’t take the stay-at-home route and be a programmer or something, no, you had to want to be the hero!_

Revving his engine again, he pressed forwards, Eret and Tubbo following closely behind. Their normal patrol route was this way, he was ninety percent certain, so this was where they needed to be.

Everything in front of him was white, though. White rushed at his face, bit at his fingers, it really made up the entirety of his surroundings. _Well_ , he qualified internally, _I guess the fog is more grey than white. But that’s it!_ His musings on color theory were interrupted, though, when his oh-so-trusty snowmobile suddenly sputtered and died beneath him. _Shit_.

Kicking at the sides of the machine, Fundy cursed aloud and hopped off. Eret and Tubbo slowed to a stop beside them, the younger boy jumping off and darting over.

“Alright?” Eret called.

“It’s dead!” Fundy replied. “We’ll have to find somewhere to – woah, where did that come from?” _That_ , of course, was the imposing mansion that peered at the patrollers from the murky grey of their surroundings.

Fumbling past Skeppy, Bad sprinted onwards into the storm.

“It’s somewhere around here!” he yelled behind him.

Rumors had spread to the men’s ears about a mysterious haunting that was occurring in these woods. Bad had originally worried about angering any possible spirits, but after getting stuck in this blizzard, he’d rather face a hundred ghosts than die out here in the snow.

Eventually, Bad slowed to a stop, allowing Skeppy to catch up to him again. The two exchanged an uneasy glance as they took in the scene before them. A deep, dark mansion towered over them as it wafted from the gloom. A rouge icicle plummeted into the snow as they approached the doorway.

Knocking at the door hesitantly, Bad gave a startled squeak when it swung open on its own. He wasn’t completely certain, but he had a sinking feeling that this was the haunted place they were supposed to investigate.

As he grabbed Skeppy’s hand, only to be pulled along inside by his friend, Bad gulped.

It was going to be a long night.

Fuck. That was the one repeating thought that ran through Karl’s head. Why was it _today_ , of all days, that Dream had decided to do a manhunt? Why was it _today_ that the rest of his gang decided to go along with it? Why was it _today_ that Antfrost got sick and had to be rotated out? And why had _Karl_ chosen to sign up for this insanity in his stead?

Instead of a fun day of chasing after Dream in the woods, they were here, stranded in the middle of a _fucking superstorm_ , that a grand total of _zero_ weather reports had warned them about, chilled to the bone and lost. Thanks a lot, God!

Rubbing his hands together, Karl called after the de-facto ‘party leader.’ “Do you know where you’re going, Dream?”

“Everything’s going to be fine, Karl. Don’t worry about it,” he replied.

Karl nodded, before turning his attention back to his poor, frozen hands. He tried blowing on them to warm them up, but that didn’t work. If anything, his hands only got colder, his breath condensing and freezing before it got there.

At this point, Karl was seriously considering just asking Sapnap to let him huddle under his coat with him. That’s how desperate he was, willing to let himself look clingy and undignified, if only to save himself from losing a few fingers. However, he was distracted from making this tough decision by the sudden gasps from his friends. Where there had once been nothing but snow, snow, and more snow ahead of them, now a gloomy looking mansion proudly rose from the darkness.

“Interested, anyone?” Dream asked with a grin on his face, as he trotted up to the door and opened the way for the rest of the group to head inside.

As Wilbur and his family cautiously made their way into the house, he looked around at the deep and grasping shadows that stretched from every corner. The cobwebbed corners appeared to be observing the interlopers with scathing and disappointed eyes. Wilbur shuddered and turned back to Phil.

“Anybody have a match?” the eldest questioned, knowing the most likely answer already.

Tommy sarcastically patted his pockets, rolling his eyes at Phil like the teenager he most certainly was. The boy was frozen to the bone, pieces of his hair sticking up and threaded with icicles, teeth audibly chattering, and yet his still found the strength to be sassy. He’d collapsed, only a little while ago, and he was still acting like nothing was wrong!

Wil sighed, knowing both that he couldn’t change a single thing about Tommy and that his own backpack was hopelessly devoid of matches. Techno was certainly a no as well. He had the odd habit of carrying the most seemingly useless items that turned out useful later, but nothing that was immediately helpful.

Case in point, Techno pulled out three full wax candles from his satchel, but nothing to light them with.

Phil shook his head disappointedly. “At least we’ll have something to light later.” He continued slowly into the darkness, peering around corners and scouting out the dark rooms ahead. There was little light to be had in the darkened and dim house. No candles were lit, Wil hadn’t spotted a fireplace yet, and there was _definitely_ no electricity. This deep in the woods, on a secluded mountain, they were stranded.

Trust him, Wilbur had tried calling for help before. 1-1-2, the Ski Patrol, his mom, nothing worked. The combination of the snow and isolation in the wilderness killed any chance of Wil catching a stray cell signal.

Wil tapped aggressively at his useless phone again, though he knew that his efforts were fruitless. His phone was as useful to him as brick right now, with how dead and cold it was.

He was pulled out of his percussive maintenance, though, by a hand pulling at the back of his shirt. Wil jerked back, coughing, as he crashed into Techno’s chest. He glared at his brother, rubbing at his throat. “What the fuck, Techno?”

His brother shrugged silently before nodding his head in the direction he had just pulled Wil back from.

The narrow hallways of the mansion opened up without warning into a vast sitting room. For once, the light level increased, as a massive glass window filled up a whole wall. The light was thin and grey, but compared to the darkness from before, it felt like streams of golden sunlight pouring in.

It looked like it was a sitting room of some sort, decorated with old, moldy couches that, upon closer investigation, also were roughed up and torn in places. The stray spring escaped from a few cushions, but other than that, they looked perfectly usable.

As the family glanced around, a number of items in his surroundings caught Wil’s eye. The non-window walls, of which there were five, were haphazardly hung with an assortment of ripped paintings and sheet-covered objects. When Wil uncovered one of them, it revealed a dusty mirror. Phil did the same to another: another mirror.

Stacks of more sheet-covered items cluttered the edges. They towered precariously upwards, reaching towards the tall, vaulted ceilings. With the way they teetered, Wil was half-afraid they’d topple over any second.

The crown jewel of the room, though, was the massive fireplace set into the wall opposite them. Mortared stone climbed upwards into the ceiling, with a proud log hanging across it to serve as the mantel. Picture frames littered the mantel, each one pushed facedown with the stand on the back still extended.

Wil crept over the creaky floorboards to investigate further. He delicately lifted one up to reveal an empty frame, the protective glass front shattered in its place. He dropped it back down.

A pile of logs, recently chopped by their moisture levels and fresh scent, sat innocently stacked next to the fireplace. Interestingly, though, the actual fireplace and chimney were filled with soot and cobwebs. _Why go to all the trouble to get fresh wood if you aren’t going to use it?_ Wil wondered.

A cough sounded from behind him.

“Not now, Phil,” Wil replied thoughtlessly, halfway into shoving himself into the chimney. The cough sounded again. He groaned and removed his head from the chimney, turning to glare at Phil. “Do you mind?”

Phil was not the one coughing.

In all of his soot-covered glory, Wilbur was suddenly made aware of the presence of nine new people in the room. How he’d missed them, he had no idea. Wil rubbed the back of his head sheepishly, which really only dislodged more ash and sent it pluming off into the still air.

“Um, hi?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments are my lifeblood, I swear. The amount of serotonin I get from reading them is incredible. 
> 
> But don't feel obligated to do it! :)
> 
> Enjoy the show!


	2. Dramatis Personae

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Meet the cast!

As she stared at the man unfolding himself from the chimney, Niki stifled a giggle. Sure, they were in a tense situation, stranded in the middle of the biggest snowstorm she’d seen in ages, surrounded by a bunch of strangers, but it was funny, the way his attempts to clean himself up only smeared more soot onto his face. He glanced around the assembled group, before sheepishly saying, “Um, hi?”

The man rubbed his nose, leaving a thick black trail behind, before wrinkling his nose and sneezing. Niki couldn’t contain herself any longer. She bent in half, practically cackling at the ridiculousness of the situation. Behind her, Eret started chuckling as well. She was sure that she looked mad, but Niki was past the point of caring.

Composing herself, great heaving breaths escaping her, Niki brushed her hair back from her face and took in the amused and concerned faces of the crowd around her. “Sorry about that,” she smiled, before hiccupping loudly. She went cross-eyed looking at her own nose, startled by herself. It was the sooty man’s turn to laugh now, though his was much more reserved and controlled than Niki's.

Niki hiccupped again. “Hi, everybody.” She received a few small waves in return. “Uh, it looks like we might be stuck here for a while together. Shall we go around and do introductions?”

A man in a green hoodie layered beneath the parka that he was quickly shedding stepped forward. A face mask embroidered with a simple smiley face covered his mouth and nose. He pulled it down as he began speaking. “Hey, guys. Um, I’m Dream, I guess.” He chuckled nervously. “Is there anything else I need to cover?”

“Dream? What kind of a name is that?” the kid shivering in the corner asked. The poor thing was clearly soaked through his thin clothes, ones more suited to a breezy autumn day than the harsh wintry storm they were facing now. The red on the sleeves of his shirt had turned maroon in its dampness, and his jeans were practically frozen stiff.

“Oh, really?” Dream asked. “Let’s hear your name, Mister ‘High-and-Mighty.’”

“Gladly,” the kid responded, taking off one of his shoes. He removed his sock and held it up before twisting it. Niki was almost impressed by the amount of water that dripped down from the sock. “I’m Tommy, _Dream_. What are you gonna do with that, eh, big man?”

Dream rolled his eyes exasperatedly. “Okay, _Tomathy_.” Before Tommy could respond, practically foaming at the mouth in indignation, Dream gestured to his side.

One of the guys who’d arrived with Dream, with a headband tied around his forehead and a white sweatshirt worn, for some reason, _over_ his winter jacket, lifted his hand up. “What’s up, y’all. I’m Sapnap.”

Next to him, another man interjected, “and I’m Karl!” Sapnap high-fived him. Karl’s jacket was full of garishly clashing colors, but as he took it off, an actually sensible and stylish sweater rested underneath. He ran a hand through his hair, shaking out a sizeable amount of snow.

The man in blue with ridiculously sized goggles sighed. He raised the goggles up to his hairline, before waving softly. “I’m George.” In contrast to the rest of his group, George spoke with a British accent. His parka was blue, the shirt beneath it was blue, well, suffice it to say Niki could tell what George’s favorite color was.

Sapnap leaned his arm on George’s head, the shorter man protesting the treatment the whole time. “So, we were just kinda dicking around in the woods-”

“As one does,” Karl added.

“-and then this huge fuckin’, uh, snowstorm just shows up outta nowhere. We were freezing out there, so we just kinda grouped together and found this place.” He nodded decisively. “And that’s our story.”

The older man next to Tommy spoke next. “Hello, everybody.” His voice was pleasant and soothing as he spoke. “First of all, I apologize for Tommy.”

“Hey.”

The pink-haired man behind them snorted. “He’s not wrong, Tommy.”

“You know what, Technoblade, you can just shut the fuck up.”

“Make me, child.”

“Boys!” the man shouted. Their argument quieted. “They’re always like that, I’m sorry. Anyways, I’m Phil, and this is Wilbur,” he gestured to the soot-covered man, “and Techno,” a nod to the pink-haired man.

“Sup,” Techno said.

Dream huffed. “So you mean to tell me, Tommy, that ‘Technoblade’ is a perfectly normal name to you, but Dream is where you draw the line?”

“Technoblade is cool and pogchamp, big man, that’s why he gets to keep his name.”

Techno rolled his eyes. “I’m so glad that I have your approval, Tommy.”

Phil rubbed the space between his eyebrows. “And you’ve already met Tommy.”

This group was a bit more eclectic than Dream and his friends. Tommy had made terrible decisions in wintry gear, Wilbur was covered in a beanie and thick trench coat over a yellow turtleneck, and Phil had sensible snow boots on, paired with a dark green parka. Techno…

Well, Niki didn’t quite know how to describe what Techno was wearing. Draped in a thick red cloak lined with white fur, he looked like he’d fit in better at a Renaissance Fair than in this mansion on the mountain. He wore a white button-up tucked into black slacks. At the very least, his boots looked well-worn and good for hiking.

Niki brushed off his odd apparel choice. Technoblade could wear whatever he wanted to wear; she wouldn’t judge.

“So how did you end up stranded here?” she asked.

Tommy scoffed. Wilbur groaned. “Here we go.”

The boy immediately took this as his cue to start a tirade stuffed with swearing and insults. Niki couldn’t quite understand all of it, what with his rapid pace and jumbling words and vehement cursing, but the general idea she picked up was that his family had been on a hike when they got snowed in.

Fundy eyed Tommy. “And why aren’t you wearing proper clothes for this weather?”

It was effective at halting Tommy for mere moments. “It’s called fashion and _style_ , man. Who do you think you are to criticize my outfit choice like this when you’re wearing that ridiculously ugly coat? Ski Patrol?”

Fundy looked down at his parka, picking at it and pretending to be hurt. “We _are_ the Ski Patrol.”

Tommy blinked. “Oh.”

Niki took this chance to take her turn to speak. “I’m Niki! And this is Eret and Fundy! We've got a fourth member around here somewhere,” she glanced around for Tubbo, but he’d disappeared from behind her. _Probably got distracted and started exploring_ , she reasoned. “We’re all in the Ski Patrol like Fundy already said, and we’re a little stuck here because one of the snowmobiles broke down and it’s kind of hard to get around in this weather without them.”

The rest of her crew smiled and waved at everybody. Niki was glad that she got to work with such friendly, kind people.

Eret moved over to the fireplace. “It’s freezing in here, and I’m sure you’re all cold.” Niki saw a couple of people startle at the depth of Eret’s voice. “Let’s get a fire started, alright?”

“Please,” Tommy called over.

“Niki?” Tubbo yelled from somewhere in the hallway behind her. “Where are we- oh, that’s a lot of people.”

Tommy’s face lit up. “Tubbo!”

“Tommy?”

“Holy shit, man!” Tommy sprinted over to Tubbo and hugged him tightly. “I didn’t know you worked here!”

“Dude, you’re freezing,” Tubbo protested, halfheartedly trying to push Tommy off him. “But yeah, I only started recently.”

“Pog!”

Phil’s eyes flitted back and forth between the two boys. “I take it you know him, Tommy?”

Tommy turned back to face him. “This is only Tubbo, Phil! The coolest guy ever!”

“Aww, Tommy.”

“Shut up, man.”

Niki giggled. “Yeah, that’s Tubbo, he’s the fourth member of our patrol. Anyways, Eret’s right, we should get a fire going to warm everything up.”

The two patrol members stacked the logs with experienced and confident hands, and before long, they had a cozy fire crackling merrily in the fireplace. Tommy, of course, had claimed pride of place and seated himself directly in front of it, sighing happily at the warmth licking at his back.

“So… we haven’t introduced ourselves yet, I don’t think,” one of the members of the final duo piped up. “I’m Bad-”

“That’s his name, by the way, not a description,” his companion interrupted.

“Yes, thank you Skeppy, my name is Bad, and this is Skeppy.”

Skeppy took over quickly. “We came out here to look for ghosts.”

Everybody else was silent, as if waiting for him to continue. Skeppy crossed his arms over his chest and leaned back on the couch he was seated on. Apparently, he was finished.

Bad was bundled up tightly in black snow gear, covering almost every inch of his skin. The only bit that Niki could see was the upper half of his face, where wire-rimmed glasses sat in front of kind eyes. Already Niki had decided that she liked him.

Skeppy, on the other hand, had unzipped his blue parka to show off a Gucci sweatshirt. His black hair was mussed, and he radiated restrained mischief.

As nighttime approached and the world outside darkened, the flickering fire became the only source of light. Its small size, though, couldn’t quite reach every inch of the massive room they were in, leaving the corners hidden and foreboding. The orange glow and stretching shadows created an eerie atmosphere for the stranded group.

Still, Niki tried to distract herself from the pit in her stomach with the light conversation flowing around. They had decided as a group that they would sleep in here tonight, what with it being the only place that had any source of warmth, so far as they could tell. For now, they were all spending time getting to know one another.

George was apparently colorblind, and Tommy and Tubbo had taken to this fact with extreme delight and kept holding up different colored objects for him to try to tell apart. They were probably a bit disappointed when he could guess most of them correctly, but Niki didn’t have the heart to tell them that it was because the items they chose made it obvious.

Phil and Eret had started comparing recipes for something – Niki couldn’t quite make out what – as they uncovered and disassembled some of the more precarious stacks around the edges of the room. Nobody really wanted to go exploring the creepy mansion this late at night, so this was their best hope for supplies. In digging through them, they’d found some assorted cookware, a few more torn paintings, a number of worn blankets, and some musical instruments. Wilbur had promptly coopted the guitar and was now carefully tuning it as he sat by Tommy.

Fundy and Dream were talking about coding, or so Niki guessed. Not being an expert in that field herself, she couldn’t follow the thread of rapid-fire conversation, but they appeared to be in the midst of a lighthearted debate about projects they’d done.

“I made it so you can ride the Ender Dragon in Minecraft!”

“Oh, _child’s play_ , Dream. I coded a literal _movie_ into the game, with audio and everything! Beat that!” Fundy retorted.

Dream went silent for a few moments, before sighing and conceding, “Alright, yeah, that’s pretty impressive.”

“ _Thank_ you.”

Technoblade looked to be doing his best to tune out Skeppy, who was trying quite hard to start up a conversation with him. He had his eyes closed and head leaned back, and occasionally would groan whenever Skeppy said something particularly shrilly. Bad tapped on Skeppy’s arm every now and then, clearly trying to get his friend to stop bothering poor Techno, but Skeppy waved him off every time.

Karl and Sapnap were already asleep, leaning on each other in such a way that they were both sat upright. Sapnap was snoring softly.

Glancing at all the people around her, Niki decided that this was a pretty good group to be stuck with during a blizzard.

Her attention was suddenly grasped by a melodious guitar strum. It seemed that Wilbur had finished his tuning. The room hushed.

“Oh, um, okay.” Wilbur looked startled by his suddenly attentive audience. He laughed nervously. “Any suggestions?”

“‘Never Gonna Give You Up,’” Skeppy called without hesitation.

Wilbur pointed at him sharply. “Absolutely not.” His eyes flitted upwards for a few moments before they lit up. “Okay, how about this one?” He started strumming softly, fingers darting nimbly across the strings. Wilbur’s voice, as he started singing, was low and melodic.

“ _How many roads must a man walk down/Before you call him a man?/How many seas must a white dove sail/Before she sleeps in the sand?/Yes, and how many times must the cannonballs fly/Before they're forever banned?_ ”

Niki found herself slowly swaying along to the mellow tune.

“ _The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind/The answer is blowin' in the wind_.”

She watched as Karl lifted his head up for a moment, blinked at Wilbur, then closed his eyes again and drifted back to sleep.

“ _Yes, and how many years can a mountain exist/Before it is washed to the sea?/Yes, and how many years can some people exist/Before they're allowed to be free?/Yes, and how many times can a man turn his head/And pretend that he just doesn't see?_ ”

Despite the slightly melancholy lyrics, Niki’s mood was lightened by the gleam in Wilbur’s eyes as he played, clearly in his element.

“ _The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind/The answer is blowin' in the wind_.”

Phil’s fingers were tapping a steady beat on his thigh, while Fundy’s hands were lifted up to his mouth. It looked like he was miming playing a harmonica during the instrumental breaks in Wilbur’s words.

“ _Yes, and how many times must a man look up/Before he can really see the sky?/Yes, and how many ears must one man have/Before he can hear people cry?/Yes, and how many deaths will it take 'til he knows/That too many people have died?_ ”

Wilbur’s strumming slowed down as the song came to a close.

“ _The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind/The answer is blowin' in the wind._ ”

He finished with a flourish, his hand outstretched to his side like a rock star. The people still awake clapped softly, careful not to wake those already asleep.

“What song was that?” Niki asked.

“Bob Dylan, ‘Blowin’ in the Wind,’” Wilbur replied.

From his spot beside him, Tommy piped up, “You should play one of your songs, Wil.”

Wilbur quickly raised his hands in denial. “Oh, no, no, no, no, no.”

“Sure, Big Dub!”

Glancing around at the eager eyes on him, he sighed. “Maybe. _But not tonight!_ ” he added hastily. “It’s pretty late, I think we should get some rest. Hopefully, the storm will blow over by morning.”

And so with faint echoes of music in her ears and new friends all around her, Niki bedded down and drifted off to sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All is gentle and calm for our protagonists now. Isn't it nice, to go to sleep with a song and friends?
> 
> See you soon as the show continues!


	3. Isaac Climbed Up the Mountain

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Here is where our story really begins...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What happens when there is no one to intercede?

Grey light filtered through the massive window as Bad woke up from his uneasy night of rest. It wasn’t the morning that had awakened him, though. That honor went to the copious amounts of sneezing coming from the pile to his left. Tommy was awake, apparently.

Bad shuffled out of his cocoon of blankets and cautiously stepped his way across the room. Tommy looked miserable. He was huddled in his blanket, shivering and sneezing occasionally. The poor kid’s hair was mussed and heavy bags laid under his eyes. Bad doubted that he’d slept much the night before.

He crouched down. “Tommy, how’re you doing?”

“I’m perfectly fine, big man.” Tommy sneezed again. “One hundred percent, never been better.”

Bad raised an eyebrow, looking the clearly ill boy up and down. “Sure.”

The teen suddenly erupted into a coughing fit. Around them, people started stirring. Bad distinctly heard someone – _Technoblade?_ – mutter, “No, no, the potatoes need me.”

Tommy looked down at his knees, pulled to his chest underneath his blankets. “Alright, so maybe being soaked through last night got to me. But I’ll be fine in a bit!” He rubbed his nose, which was rapidly looking redder the more Bad looked at it.

Sighing, Bad turned back to the slowly waking crowd. He made eye contact with Niki, whose eyes were soft and concerned behind her messy black-and-blonde hair. Bad nodded his head towards one of the branching corridors, and Niki grinned in confirmation. He patted Tommy’s shoulder one more time, saying “Get some rest, okay?” before pushing himself back up to his feet.

Making his way over to Niki, Bad offered the girl a hand up, and together they quietly edged their way out of the living room.

Bad’s first impression of Niki had been a positive one. She hadn’t hesitated on breaking the silence and getting people talking to each other, and she’d been bright and optimistic the whole time. Bad felt a little bit like he’d found a kindred spirit in her. Her status as a part of Ski Patrol didn’t hurt either. That whole group was a fantastic one to have on their side. Eret, tall and deep-voiced, with a pair of dark sunglasses constantly either over his eyes or resting atop his head, despite the winter season. Fundy, with his bright ginger hair and easy comradery with Dream, as well as the intelligence he’d demonstrated in their little achievement comparison. And Tubbo, a bubbly teenager who’d latched onto Tommy – apparently, they’d known each other before this – and been chatty and energetic the whole time. All of them had taken the stranding in stride and easily delegated tasks to everyone, keeping them moving and productive. Really, with them in here with him, Bad was sure that everything was going to be fine!

“Niki, Tommy’s coming down with something.”

She frowned sympathetically. “I could hear. I think it was inevitable after seeing him last night.”

“What can we do to help?”

“Keep him warm, keep him hydrated, give him plenty of time to sleep, and tissues wouldn’t be a bad idea either, but I’m not sure how likely we are to find some of those in here. Maybe some fabric to use as a handkerchief,” she listed, counting each piece off on her fingers.

Bad nodded resolutely. “Alright, that I can do.” He paused. “Actually, wait, one other thing. Do you think it’s worth it to try to find a kitchen? It’s just, I don’t want to use the fire in here for cooking, not with how ashy it is, and we should see if there’s any food, too.”

“Sure! Is there anybody else you want to bring? Oh, and we should grab some lights, too!”

The pair poked their heads back inside the common room. The only people up and about were Phil and George, both of whom were carefully navigating their way through the sleeping bodies on the floor. Niki waved them both over.

“What’s up?” Phil asked lowly once he finally stepped out into the hallway with them, George following closely behind.

Niki bounced on her heels. “Do you two want to come exploring with us to find a kitchen? And then we can surprise everyone with breakfast!”

George agreed quickly, as did Phil. The older man picked his way back towards his spot, where he grabbed a set of wax candles that he had for some reason, before speeding back. Bad lifted an eyebrow questioningly, to which he responded simply, “Technoblade.”

Bad shrugged and accepted it, because really, what else what he supposed to do?”

Niki lit Phil’s candles with a lighter from her pack – Ski Patrol preparedness paid off again – and the quartet moved deeper into the house.

The hallway they had chosen was long and narrow, with few doors leading off from it. They’d come upon only three so far, and one was locked. One of the doors they opened led to a linen closet, which was filled with more spiders and moths than actual sheets and towels. They moved on from that door quickly.

The other door was unlocked but resisted opening. Either there was something behind it, or it was just frozen in place after not being used for a long time. Niki pulled on it repeatedly to no avail, and George tried after her with the same result.

Once it came to Phil’s turn to try, though, he didn’t waste any time with the handle. As Bad watched in confusion, Phil took a deep breath, stepped back to the other side of the hall, and rammed his shoulder into the door. It flew off the frame and into the newly revealed room. Bad offered the older man a hand up from the floor, which was taken with a soft grin of accomplishment. Niki and George stayed where they were.

“Come on guys, ramming the door off its hinges really isn’t that big of a deal,” Bad started.

“N-no, it’s not that,” George stammered, pointing into the room.

The first look inside showed an ominous space. It was tiny, barely more than a closet in size. Despite this, it looked like a bedroom of sorts: there was a mattress squeezed inside, a little lightbulb hanging valiantly from the ceiling, and an exposed boiler on the wall. Who would sleep here, Bad had no idea, but it really gave him the heebie-jeebies.

“All in favor of putting the door back and moving on?” George offered.

“Aye,” the rest of the party chorused. Phil picked the fallen door up from its resting spot half on top of the mattress and gingerly placed it back in its spot. He patted it twice, muttering an apology.

Together they continued their exploration, turning a corner past the little room and moving on from there. Bad was still surprised at how little branching there was in as massive of a house as this. It was a straightforward hallway; the only hard part was finding the right room.

It was when George finally shouted a triumphant “Yes!” that Bad knew they’d found something useful.

Useful it was, indeed. George had found the fabled kitchen. Wide-open with a large marble island in the center, it looked like something straight out of an interior design magazine – if an outdated edition. Thick wooden cabinets hung from the white-tiled walls. A wood-burning stove had a whole wall to itself, the focal point of the room. A door opened off to the side, presumably to a pantry, which Bad hoped was stocked. Indeed, as he cautiously opened the door, there were shelves sparsely populated with simple nonperishable foods. Curiously, there was also a trapdoor in the floor.

“Hey, anybody want to check this out with me?” he called behind him.

“What’s up?” Phil asked.

“There’s this trapdoor in the pantry.”

“Huh, alright, kinda weird.” The older man ambled over, and together they lifted the surprisingly heavy trapdoor, revealing a staircase leading downwards. They exchanged uneasy glances.

“After you,” Bad joked. Phil shrugged and started downwards, Bad following close behind. “Oh, jackpot!”

The room they’d found was a cellar, much colder than the already chilly house they were in. A bunch of food was stored in there: cuts of meat, milk, vegetables, all the things Bad hadn’t expected to find in a house entirely devoid of electricity.

Niki and George stuck their heads in. “Oh, you found the root cellar!” the girl exclaimed happily.

“The what?”

“It’s like a fridge. Since it’s underground, the food stays colder and so it keeps for longer. They used to be pretty common before electricity was a major thing for everybody.”

“Huh. You learn something new every day.” Phil turned back to the food they’d found. “How long do you think this’ll last?”

Niki held her hand up to her chin, considering. Bad could practically see the numbers dancing behind her eyes. “Well, factoring in the emergency rations Fundy, Eret, Tubbo and I have, plus the fact that there’s fourteen of us…less than a week probably, but we’ll have to ration it. The sooner this storm breaks, though, the sooner we can radio for help and get out.” Seeing the looks on their faces, she hurried to add, “It’s probably not going to last a week! The storm, that is. It’ll probably continue for the rest of today, maybe some of tomorrow if we’re unlucky, but not much longer than that. We’re going to be fine!”

Bad exhaled heavily in relief. He clapped his hands together loudly. “Well, then, let’s get to cooking!”

Eret stretched, slowly sitting up to face the day. That had not been a fun night of sleep for the tall man. His back popped a few satisfying times, but there was a knot that still remained. He groaned.

“Hey, buddy, welcome to the land of the living.”

“Oh, shut up, Fundy,” Eret called back to the familiar voice. “I’d bet that you only got up like five minutes ago.”

“You can’t prove anything,” Fundy sing-songed. Eret scowled playfully at him before clambering to his feet, shoving the blankets off himself as he went.

Glancing around, Eret couldn’t help but notice a few glaring absences. “Where’s Niki?”

Fundy shrugged. “Apparently, she went off exploring with a couple others. Tommy said he saw them go down one of the hallways.” He pointed at the corridor that nobody had entered through originally.

“Do we know why?”

“Wanting to explore, they were bored, who knows, man.”

Eret sighed and began folding up his blankets. He piled them onto one of the couches before slinging his pack over his shoulder, pulling out a flashlight as he did so. “Want to go find them?”

“Yes!” someone shouted from behind him. Eret jumped, clutching at his chest, heart pounding. Skeppy started laughing uproariously. “Oh, man, you should have seen your face!”

Fundy grinned at him awkwardly. “I think everybody is coming with. They’re pretty much all awake anyway.” Indeed, Fundy was correct, as Eret surveyed the room once again. The only people he could see curled up on the floor were Tommy and Sapnap, the latter of the two snoring loudly. Karl, clearly excited by the prospect of moving around, scurried over to Sapnap and shook him awake. As Sapnap groaned at his friend, Eret looked over to Wilbur. The tallest of their group was exchanging a worried glance with his brother as he tucked Tommy in more securely.

Wilbur walked over to Eret. “I think we should leave Tommy to rest for now. He’s tired and sick, so I want him to sleep and hopefully get over it sooner.”

Eret nodded in agreement as Tubbo piped up, “Is he alright?”

“He’s probably got a cold or something after yesterday,” Wilbur reassured him. “He’ll be okay, just let him sleep.”

And with that, the group headed down the hallway, Fundy and Eret at the lead. With his flashlight illuminating the dark path, Eret could see that Niki, Phil, George, and Bad had been this way. Every door they passed was ajar, in contrast to the ones Eret remembered passing when he first arrived in the mansion. Well, every door except for one, which was shoved haphazardly into its frame, slightly crooked. Eret resolved to check on that one later.

After a short while of journeying down the hallway, turning a few corners, the party finally heard distant clanging and clamor. Vaguely, Eret could hear someone shout, “ _Come on!_ ” The aggressiveness in the tone worried him for a split second, but as they finally walked into a kitchen, they could see that the angry words were from George directed at a pancake splattered on the ceiling.

The incredulousness of that sight baffled Eret for a split second before he started laughing, Dream wheezing out a noise not unlike a teakettle next to him. George turned around and sputtered indignantly at his friend. Niki and Bad were hiding giggles behind their hands, side-eyeing each other with the looks of people who knew this was coming. Phil simply pinched his nose, sighing, “You said you could do it, George. I don’t know why we trusted you to do it when Niki and Bad have been doing so well already.”

While Phil gestured to the stack of gorgeous golden pancakes that Eret was only just now noticing, George argued, “I can! “

Phil raised an eyebrow and slowly tilted his head upwards to several other unfortunately lost pancakes, all stuck to the ceiling.

“Okay, so there’s something wrong with the pan! I’ve done this before! Dream, Sapnap, tell them!” Of course, Dream and Sapnap were too busy laughing at their friend to defend him from the heinous accusations of pancake incompetence.

Bad quickly ushered George away from the pan, expertly drizzling a new round of batter into it.

“Oh, yes! Pancakes from Bad!” Skeppy exclaimed. “You guys have not lived until you’ve had pancakes made by Bad.”

“I can’t wait,” Eret commented. Honestly, his mouth was watering just looking at the perfect stack. The quartet had really outdone themselves with them. It looked like Niki had even made jam; her ability to just throw food together perfectly scared him sometimes, but he was always grateful to be able to eat it.

While Bad finished up the batch of pancakes, Phil and Niki herded the massive group over to an adjacent dining room. A long, proud table extended along it, with an intricate chandelier hanging overhead. Candles had already been lit, giving the room a flickering orange ambiance. For the oppressive atmosphere that permeated the whole mansion, this room felt rather homey and intimate, especially as people gathered in seats and began chatting and laughing with each other. Niki and Phil set out plates for everyone, George placing Niki’s jam in the center of the table. Bad finally brought out the tower of pancakes, triumphantly setting them down and announcing, “Dig in!”

Oh, but those pancakes were heavenly on Eret’s tongue. Buttery and sweet, he would give these pancakes every award he possibly could. Judging by the noises everyone else was making, they agreed with the sentiment.

The table was a little bit crowded with their fourteen strong group – well, thirteen, since Tommy was still sleeping – but that only added to the familial atmosphere. Eret was surprised at how close they’d all gotten, considering that everyone had met only last night. He supposed that being snowed in together provided great grounds for getting along.

Bad pushed his plate away first, standing up from his seat. “I’m going to go check on Tommy.”

Wilbur and Phil nodded from where they were still chewing happily.

Bad pointed his finger accusingly at everyone at the table as he turned to leave. “There had better be leftovers for him when I come back, alright?” Silence. “Alright?” he repeated forcefully.

Everyone nodded quickly. Satisfied, Bad finally exited the room, and the conversation picked back up again.

About half an hour later, everyone’s plates were empty, and only three pancakes remained from however many they’d started with. The group had unanimously agreed to follow Bad’s ruling on leaving pancakes for Tommy, glaring down Skeppy when he tried to snag a few more. The conversation had wound down, everybody waiting on Bad to return with Tommy.

Eret was starting to get worried. It had only taken his group about ten minutes to get to the kitchen, and they were taking it slowly and carefully. Bad would surely have been able to navigate his way to the common room and back much faster than that. Maybe Tommy had just been stubborn about waking up.

Still, there was a pit resting heavily in his stomach. “Do you think we should check on Bad and Tommy?” he asked.

A few glances were tossed back and forth before Wilbur shot up. “I don’t know about you all, but I’m heading back. Right now. Something about this doesn’t feel right.”

“Maybe Tommy’s just not wanting to move, or Bad got lost, or Tommy’s really sick, or-” Sapnap tried to reason.

“Maybe,” Wilbur allowed. “But I’d feel better if we checked.”

As a whole, everyone quickly stacked their dishes and put them on the kitchen counter before swiftly heading back to the living room. The timing of it confirmed Eret’s anxieties: it had only taken them about three minutes to make it to the common room.

Upon their entry, they could clearly see Tommy, still curled up in his cocoon of blankets. Wilbur and Phil audibly sighed in relief. Skeppy, though, started fidgeting nervously. Wilbur walked over to Tommy and gently shook him awake.

“W-what? Wil? What’s up, Big Dub?” Tommy asked groggily. “I was having a nice sleep.”

“I know Tommy, but can you answer a question for me really quick? Have you seen Bad?”

“Bad? I mean, I saw him this morning headed out down the hall over there, but I haven’t seen him since. I’ve been sleeping.”

“Shit.”

Tommy sat up, rubbing his eyes. “What’s wrong?”

Skeppy jumped in. “He was supposed to come back here to get you, but that was like thirty minutes ago. We haven’t seen him since he left.”

“Oh, shit.”

“Alright, nobody panic.” Fundy stepped up. “We need to start looking for him, and I think we need to split up to do that. Use the buddy system, go in groups of three or more, and cover all the halls and move outward. Yell if you find him.”

Eret grouped up with Tubbo and Niki, the trio anxiously starting down the hallway they’d entered the house from. They opened every door they could find, discovering a dusty study, a room with musical instruments displayed on the walls, two bathrooms – Eret took note of those spots for future reference – and a bedroom, even a ballroom, but no sign of Bad.

Just as he was beginning to give up hope, Eret heard a faint and far-off scream. He looked at Niki, who stared back, her eyes wide and face pale. Tubbo grabbed for their hands, and, fingers interlocked, the patrollers sprinted towards the source of the scream.

The commotion increased in volume and intensity as they got closer; a great help to them finding their way to the right spot, but a bad sign for what awaited them. Tubbo slowed down, hesitating a bit. “Guys, I- I don’t know if we should go in there.”

Irritated, Eret pulled him further onwards. “Tubbo, we don’t have _time for this!_ ” At the teen’s hurt look, he sighed. “I’m sorry, Tubbo. I’m worried about Bad.”

“It’s okay, man. I get it.”

“It’s just, well, this isn’t a _game_. Bad could be hurt.”

“I know, Eret. I’m just – I’m scared about what we’ll find.”

The decision was taken out of their hands, though, when Karl, his face bloodless, burst out of the door. He shook his head slowly. His hands were shaking. “Guys, it’s – it’s not good.” Tubbo gulped audibly.

They followed Karl inside to find Bad. Or, well, Bad’s body. Inside the room, which was a bedroom of some sort, the walls painted a deep red, the bed hung with heavy drapery – and wasn’t that fitting, Eret thought – Bad lay on the bed. His arms were spread wide, his neckerchief sloppily pulled down to his neck, his mouth wide open. A crucifix hung above the center of the bed, and Eret couldn’t help but notice the similarities in their positions.

Niki covered Tubbo’s eyes.

Most horrifyingly, a thick knife still stuck out of Bad’s chest, with clear gaping wounds spattered across his torso. The blood had progressed to oozing sluggishly out.

He had not died particularly recently. He had laid there, for ages, as they ate pancakes and then scoured the rest of the house for him and oh God Bad was _dead_.

A whimper sounded from behind Eret, and as he turned to face the person who made it, his heart sunk further, if that was even possible. Skeppy stood in the doorway, hand to his mouth as he stared at the dead body of his friend. “Bad?”

In a sudden clumsy flurry of movement, Skeppy pushed his way past Eret and Karl and Sapnap, grasping his friend’s hand and holding it to his chest. “Bad? Come on man, this isn’t funny, come on Bad, please, just get up!” He sobbed. “I’m sorry for all those pranks I played on you, man, I promise it’ll never happen again, I’ll never make fun of you calling people muffins or yelling ‘language’ ever again, just please, get up!”

Bad didn’t move. His hand flopped uselessly back to the bedspread.

And softly, with the teary and shellshocked eyes of twelve other people on him, Skeppy held his closest friend’s bloody body close, and cried.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I look forward to seeing the Sherlock Holmes-ing begin!


	4. - .... . / ..-. --- --- .-..

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Halloween!
> 
> I know that I, personally, will be spending my night dressed as a witch.

It was straight out of everyone’s worst nightmare. Stuck in a cabin in the middle of the woods, no way out, no way to call for help, and with a murderer on the loose. At least, that was what George assumed. Really, the number of stab marks on Bad – _Bad’s body, oh god_ – were indicative of someone else doing it. Like, George didn’t think that Bad had done it to himself, he’d seemed nice and happy; he didn’t know him well so he couldn’t be sure, but his gut was screaming foul play at him.

He was in shock, he thought. George knew he should be feeling something more visceral than numb surprise, but his eyes kept trailing back to Bad’s body. His bloody, cold body.

_How-_

_What-_

_Who-_

_Why-_

Over and over, George’s thoughts ended abruptly. His mind was stuttering like an old record, skipping back over and over to the only thing he was sure of now.

Bad was dead.

Blood marks trailed across the ceiling of the four-poster bed Bad was splayed on, and the already-red comforter had only grown more so. It was a grisly sight to look at.

Skeppy, who had been pulled back from the body, was still sobbing quietly as Niki and Phil consoled him. His expensive designer sweatshirt was thoroughly stained. George, though, was pretty sure that Skeppy was past the point of caring about his clothes. Not when his best friend was dead.

Which brought George’s thoughts back to the start.

Bad was dead.

He had been murdered.

Which meant that somebody had murdered him.

Somebody here was a murderer.

Now George’s eyes widened. He whipped his head back and forth to the gathered people in the room. One of them, one of these seemingly nice people that he’d had the luck to be stranded with, was a cold-blooded killer. They’d picked Bad, out of everyone, to kill. Bad!

Tommy and Tubbo, the two youngest of the group, were clustered in the furthest corner of the room. Tommy was stood half in front of his friend as if trying to shield him from the horrific reality in front of them. _They’re just kids_ , George thought. _They shouldn’t have to see this kind of thing_.

“Wilbur? Technoblade?” the Brit asked. He jerked his head at the teenagers. “Can one of you-?”

“On it,” Wilbur replied.

As Wilbur escorted Tommy and Tubbo out, Dream started taking stock of the situation. “So,” he started, pausing for a long moment. George could sympathize. Everybody was feeling lost. “Um, it seems like we have a murder on our hands.” Skeppy’s sobs renewed in intensity, Niki whispering to him again and rubbing his back. Dream winced, then coughed. “Right. Um. Yeah…” he trailed off.

Technoblade picked up from there. “So Bad is dead. And somebody killed him. So we’ve got to figure out who did it.”

“Are we sure it’s a murder, though?” Karl offered hopefully.

Techno leveled him with a dead, sarcastic stare. “This isn’t exactly a ‘whoops, I tripped and fell down the stairs’ kind of death. You really think a person could do this to themselves? No, I’m calling foul play.”

Niki finally stood up and escorted a distraught Skeppy out of the room, George sharing a sympathetic look with her. Everyone else either watched them go with pity in their eyes or carefully and pointedly _didn’t_ watch.

Turning back to the matter at hand, George nearly jumped out of his skin when Technoblade suddenly darted over directly into his personal space, looming over him. The taller man hummed at him, looking George up and down in a way that left him feeling exposed, before swiftly turning away and moving on to the next person.

George watched in confusion as Techno swept his way around the room, analyzing everyone with a considering eye. He leaned over to Dream. “Do you know what he’s doing?” he whispered out of the corner of his mouth.

“No clue.”

Making his way to the center of the room, Techno finally cleared his throat. Silence filled the air. Everyone held their breath, waiting for him to share some insight he’d gleaned into the death of one of their own. Had he figured out the culprit? Did he at least have suspects? _What did he know?_

There was an awkward pause. Someone coughed.

“Yeah, I’ve got nothing,” Technoblade finally proclaimed. Scattered groans arose around the room.

“Come on, man, all that buildup for nothing?” Karl heckled. As Technoblade’s eyes turned to him again, he held his hands up in apology, stepping back.

The center of attention once more, Techno sighed. His shoulders raised, tensing. George could tell he was uncomfortable. “Look, we know that somebody killed him, alright? That’s not the kind of blood spray or wound pattern you get from something self-inflicted.”

Sapnap interrupted. “How would _you_ know that, huh?”

Rolling his eyes, Techno replied, “I watch a lot of true crime documentaries, okay? Sue me.”

“Sure, man. _Sure_.”

“If we could get back on topic?” Sapnap gestured at Techno magnanimously. “Thank you. So, it stands to reason that somebody here killed him. The only question is who.”

“I – I don’t-” Fundy took a deep breath and restarted. “I don’t know who _could_ have done it.” There were nods of agreement around the room. “And I don’t think that’s our priority right now. I think the first thing we do should be – should be putting Bad to rest.”

“We need to figure out who did this!” Techno argued.

“With his body laying right there, still fucking _dead?_ ”

“There could be clues!”

“Techno.” Phil laid a calming hand on Technoblade’s arm.

The taller man sighed defeatedly, finally relenting. “Fine. But when the next person dies and we have no idea who did it, I will say ‘I told you so.’”

And with that joyful declaration, George and Phil carefully moved over to Bad’s body, folding his clothes over his wounds as best they could. As George reached to pull the knife from Bad’s unmoving chest, Techno outstretched his hand, then pulled it back, as if he’d had second thoughts about stopping George. George grasped the knife firmly, and with a sickening squelch, its long length slowly eased out of Bad’s body. He was surprised by how difficult it had been to remove. The knife had been stuck practically up to the hilt, and fully exposed, it was nearly a foot long, wickedly curved and coated in congealed blood. Gleaming silver had been stained in blackish-red. Honestly, it was a sight George could feel being etched into his memories. Nightmares would chase him as he slept for months, he could tell.

Somebody gagged behind him. George ignored it. He placed the blade carefully on the bedside table.

With an air of solemnity that was so different from the lightheartedness they’d all been feeling at the start of the day, Phil gathered the body into his arms. A procession formed behind him, with an honor guard of Eret and Dream at his shoulders. Techno lagged behind, looking forlornly at the bloody pool on the sheets. George could see him muttering something, though he couldn’t make out what. “Technoblade,” he called, watching the pink-haired man startle and hurry to catch up to the group.

Waiting further down the hallway were Tommy, Tubbo, and Wilbur. The older man stood protectively in front of the two teens as Tommy peeked over his shoulder. His eyes widened as he watched Phil stride past.

“Is he okay?” George heard Tubbo whisper loudly, Tommy shushing him. Wilbur just shook his head sadly, herding the boys into the parade.

It became clear to George as their march continued that Phil was leading them outside – they were taking the hallway that had led George and his group inside. As they passed by the common room, he could see Niki holding Skeppy to her side, his head turned into her shoulder. The previously boisterous man was unsettlingly quiet, standing up in silence and taking the place at Phil’s side in their line. Nobody said a word.

They finally reached the heavy side door that George and his friends had first entered less than a day ago. _God, had really been that recently? It felt so long ago._

Dream stepped forward and heaved the door open, revealing a thick layer of snow, about up to George’s thighs, blocking their path. Hoisting the body higher in his arms, Phil pressed on. The rest had no choice but to follow.

George was not happy to be freezing cold again. Freezing cold air bit at his exposed face and the deep snow soaked through his pants. Each step he took further outside required him to awkwardly maneuver his legs over the snow and into the next deep drift.

Phil took it like a trooper, shoving his way onwards, leaving deep trails in his wake. Skeppy trudged right beside him, stumbling through determinedly.

Suddenly, at what looked to George like a completely arbitrary point, Phil stopped. They were practically at the edge of the vague clearing the mansion was situated in, tall evergreen trees directly ahead of them.

“I’m gonna need some help with this.”

Eret, Dream, and Sapnap stepped forwards, and together they started clearing snow. George felt simultaneously so very disconnected from the saddening moment and so damnably involved.

Everything was silent except for the grunts of the three men digging in the snow. The still-swirling blizzard muffled every other sound.

Finally, Sapnap called out, “We hit dirt! But it’s frozen solid.” He stomped hard on the cleared ground for emphasis, and George could clearly hear the solid thud.

Phil looked to Skeppy. “It’s up to you, man. What do you want to do?”

Taking a deep breath, Skeppy whispered, “Bury him in the snow. It’s the best we can do.” He hugged himself. “I don’t want to just leave him out to rot. It just feels so _wrong_.” Nodding resolutely, he met Phil’s eyes. “Do it.”

With great care, Phil stepped into the cleared plot of earth and gently laid Bad down. Skeppy knelt down beside him and gripped his best friend’s hands in his own. He couldn’t hear what Skeppy whispered, but George was able to at least lip-read the words “miss you” and “don’t leave.” His eyes welled up and he looked away, feeling like he was intruding on a private moment.

It was a good two minutes more before George finally heard shifting and turned to see Skeppy pushing himself to his feet. A light dusting of snow already covered Bad’s body. Skeppy sniffled a few times.

He stepped out of the open spot and back into the deep snow. Niki laid her hand on his shoulder as Phil, Dream, Sapnap, and Eret started filling in the hole once more. As the final scoop of snow was shoved back into place, Skeppy started speaking again.

“Bad was my best friend.”

Everyone’s eyes turned to him. George couldn’t tell if he noticed the attention or not.

“We’ve been friends for so long that this doesn’t feel real. We pranked each other all the time. Or,” and here he laughed wetly, brokenly, “I pranked him mostly. He always took them well. He – he had this _ridiculous_ thing where he couldn’t stand swearing. He’d yell ‘language’ at anyone who did, and he always replaced swear words with ‘muffin.’ I never understood where he got that from. It was just a thing that was always a part of _Bad_.”

Skeppy’s voice cracked. “He was the nicest person ever. He loved animals so much, even if he was over the top about it. He calls his dog ‘Rat,’ you know, even though he baby-talks her a lot. But he’s a badass, too. Like, you’d never guess it, but he’s competed in shooting competitions and knife-throwing.” He looked up at the grey, cloudy sky. “He has the weirdest collection of things he’s done. He’s an ordained minister, he’s caused massive power outages on accident. People think I’m the chaotic one in our friendship, but it’s like – it’s like I do these things on purpose. Bad just exists and weird shit happens. And that’s not going to happen anymore.”

He wiped his eyes. “I don’t know where I’d be without him. I – I don’t know where I _will_ be without him.” He turned to Niki. “I’m scared about finding that out. I don’t want to know that. I just – I just want him _back._ ”

And shakily, he pulled a small keychain from his pocket. A cheerful yellow duck hung from it, swaying merrily in the harsh wintry wind. Skeppy held it close to his chest, shuddering as sobs wracked his body. Niki and Phil escorted him back inside, rubbing his back and murmuring reassurances to him. Slowly, the rest of the group trickled back to the house behind them.

At last, it was only George and Techno left outside, damp and shivering. Snow coated George’s eyelashes as he blinked in the wind.

“I didn’t know you that well.”

His companion looked up at George’s sudden words. He ignored it.

“But you were always kind and optimistic. You didn’t deserve this.”

With that, George turned and walked towards the door. “Are you coming, Techno?”

The man stood still, staring at the makeshift grave. “Give me a couple minutes. I’ll be right behind you.”

Shrugging, George pushed open the door, shaking off the snow dusting his body. He stepped inside, stomped his shoes a few times, and made his way back to the living room.

Inside, Skeppy had been given the coveted spot in front of the fireplace. Everyone was scattered around the couches in varying states of shock and grief. Only Skeppy had really known Bad, the rest only having met him less than a day ago, but his brutal and sudden death had hit everyone hard. The only people George could see who were composed were Eret, Dream, and Fundy. Tubbo was clinging tightly to Tommy, who was hugging him back just as hard. Wilbur hadn’t left either boy’s side like he was afraid that they might be next. Phil and Niki still flanked Skeppy, though neither of their faces were dry.

Skeppy himself was still crying, but it had calmed to a quiet stream of tears.

Quietly, solemnly, George took a seat on the couch beside Dream. He didn’t really feel like being far from his friends right now. _What if it had been Dream, or Sapnap, or even Karl instead?_ He shuddered. People were going to be holding each other closer tonight.

And Skeppy would be alone.

Technoblade interrupted _that_ happy thought as he marched into the room, snow still coating his shoulders. “So can we talk about the elephant in the room now?”

He received quite a few glares in return. It wasn’t exactly a tasteful move, in George’s opinion, to start bringing up murder suspects right after a semi-impromptu funeral.

“Listen, somebody murdered your friend, and we need to figure out _who_. We’ve lost a lot of evidence by burying the body and messing with the crime scene, so our best plan is figuring out suspects based on alibis and motive.”

“Dude, would you _shut the fuck up?_ Now is not the _fucking_ time,” Sapnap groaned.

“Now is the _perfect_ time. Everybody is here, no dodging questions, and nobody can go back and mess with the crime scene.”

“Bro, we’re shocked right now! Bad just fucking died, and you’re acting like it’s a neat little puzzle, like we’re playing a game of Clue. News flash! This is real life! We have actual emotions to consider! So maybe if you consider _those_ , you’d know to stop talking and let us deal with what just happened.”

Technoblade barreled on like Sapnap hadn’t spoken. “I think the first possibility to consider is Skeppy. There could be motive there that we’re unaware of, like an argument they could’ve had before arriving here. I mean, everything we know about their friendship is what we’ve seen and what Skeppy’s told us.”

Skeppy stood up, fists clenched tightly. “Is that what you think of me? Do you think I would kill my _own best friend?_ ”

Shrugging, Techno replied, “I don’t know man. I don’t know any of you that well.”

“No, fuck you, man! I would _never_ have killed Bad! Fuck you for thinking that! You know what, maybe it was you that did it! You’ve been real fucking quick to start blaming people! I think that’s a bit _suspicious_ , don’t you?”

“I was also the one who wanted the scene preserved as it was. Would the killer want to keep any evidence where it was?”

“I don’t know! Maybe it’s some kind of reverse psychology! Trying to big-brain us, right? Well, it’s not gonna work!” Skeppy was shouting, face red, eyes blazing. His entire demeanor had changed from the subdued, sad person he’d been only minutes prior. Techno, on the other hand, was solid, calm, still. He was acting unbothered by the horrifying situation they were in and the furious accusations being hurled in his face.

George was starting to feel suspicious. He took a few deep breaths. _Now is not the time to get hot-headed._

Eret suddenly spoke up from where he was leaning on the back of one of the couches. “Not that it matters or anything, but we all were together when Bad disappeared. All of us except for one.” He turned his gaze to Tommy.

The boy quickly caught on to Eret’s implication. “Woah, woah, woah, dickhead, are you seriously accusing me of murder? _Me?_ Dude, I’m sixteen, how would I be able to kill this guy?”

“Yeah, Bad was a badass, you think this scrawny kid could kill him?” Skeppy added on.

“Yeah, thank you Skeppy – wait, _hey!_ ”

Eret shrugged enigmatically. “I’m just saying, we all have alibis, except for Tommy.”

“ _Fuck you,_ man.”

“I want to get back to Technoblade here!” Skeppy shouted.

Everybody was yelling. George could see Niki and Phil trying fruitlessly to calm people down, but they couldn’t do anything in the face of the vitriol spewing from every mouth. He’d had enough.

George jumped to the coffee table in the center of the room. “Everybody, SHUT UP!”

Eyes suddenly trained on him intently, mouths left hanging open from the last hateful words they’d been saying. George shifted nervously but pressed on. “We are going to get _nowhere_ if we’re all arguing like this. All that’s going to do is make us mad at each other, and it won’t help!” Bolstered by the scattered nods he was seeing, he continued, “I think, instead, we should break into teams. Investigate different rooms, see if we can find any other evidence, rather than hurl accusations around willy-nilly!”

“Fine,” Technoblade gritted out.

“Anybody have any interesting rooms they wanted to check out?”

“There’s one down by the kitchen I want to look at!” Karl exclaimed.

“I found one upstairs,” Eret offered.

Fundy jumped up. “There’s another down one of these hallways!”

“Third floor,” Wilbur added.

George nodded resolutely. “Then those are where we’ll go. Group up again, take people with you, and whatever you do, _don’t go anywhere alone._ Break!”

Following Eret, along with Dream and Phil, George left the common room. Eret took them down one of the hallways and up a narrow, rickety set of stairs.

“This place really is like some sort of haunted house, isn’t it?” Phil commented nervously. There were a few halfhearted chuckles. Dream jittered the banister in its spot. They heard a loud crack.

“Yeah…,” Dream replied. “I have no idea how it got built, much less who lived here.”

Eret finally escorted them into a study of some sort, covered in dust, papers and books littering the desk. He picked up one of the books, holding it up to them. “Anybody down to do some investigating?”

In the hour they spent scouring the room, George noticed a few things.

Number one, everything was exceedingly dusty. Besides the fact that he sneezed every time he so much as stepped, there was also the thick residue left behind on his fingers after he touched anything. Whoever had been here last, they hadn’t been here in a very, very long time.

Number two, this mysterious previous owner had also had excellent taste in books. George spotted a few collections of Poe, _The Iliad_ and _The Odyssey_ , Charles Darwin’s _On the Origin of Species_ , and, ironically enough, a copy of _Sherlock Holmes_. The bookshelves were full to the brim with beautifully bound copies of classic literature. He couldn’t even read some of the titles; they were written in other languages.

Number three, whoever had last owned the house hadn’t moved away. What kind of person would get up and leave their home in such a mess? Some of the papers he picked up looked personal, too, like bits of poetry or snippets from a journal. They were faded with age, so it was hard to read. Still, that only left George with more questions than answers.

Before he could continue sifting through the room, though, George could hear a very familiar voice hoarsely shouting for help. _Sapnap_.

George looked at Dream worriedly, seeing the same emotion reflected back at him in his friend’s face. They dropped whatever they were holding, sprinting out of the room, Eret and Phil trailing behind.

Dream pulled ahead of George, skidding around the corners and cursing the narrow halls as they rushed towards the kitchen. The sight that they found struck George straight through the chest.

Sapnap was curled over someone in the doorway to the pantry, shaking and rocking them.

“Sapnap?” Dream called softly.

Their friend looked up at them with bloodshot eyes, tear tracks running down his face. In his arms, he held Karl, whose head was skewed at a deeply wrong angle.

Everywhere else, he looked fine! Untouched, unstabbed, wonderfully in one piece! But the odd jutting shape from his neck and the blank stare of his eyes told George that his friend was not alright.

Another person was dead. And this time, it was George’s own friend, Karl.

A sticky note fluttered to the ground from the top of the door frame. In neat cursive writing: _Hands off the leftovers._


	5. Rex

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Non ego sum Shakespeare. Quamquam, quia erat vir bonus CAPUT puto.

Phil stumbled onto the scene, dread already curling deep in his gut, to find a confirmation of his worst fears.

Whatever had happened to Bad hadn’t been a one-off. Another victim had been claimed.

 _Poor Karl_ , Phil thought. Or, well, poor everybody, really. As if summoned by the commotion, the missing groups appeared at the doorway – Niki, Wil, and Skeppy, followed by the pair of Fundy and Tubbo. Techno and Tommy emerged from behind Sapnap, visibly shocked by the scene in front of them.

“What happened?” Phil asked urgently, hating to have to ask such a question to the clearly upset Sapnap but knowing he needed to get things moving. It was serious now. Two lives lost, obviously by another’s hand. Phil’s heart was racing, thinking about the danger everybody here was in; the danger Tommy, Techno, and Wilbur were in. _Oh god, his boys, what if something happened to them?_

Tommy spoke up first, answering Phil’s harried question. “I – I don’t know, Phil, I mean – he just said he was going to get snacks! It was like two rooms away!”

“And what did we say about staying in groups?”

“It was two rooms away! He said he’d be fine!” Tommy defended himself.

“Well, clearly he’s not.”

Sapnap curled further over Karl, shaking harder.

“How long has it been between when he left and when you found him?” Phil tried.

“It’s been like fifteen minutes,” Techno answered. “He left, and we thought he was fine, and then it felt like a while, and, well…”

“And then this,” Tommy finished, uncharacteristically somber. For once, it seemed like he grasped the severity of the situation they were in.

Silence descended over the group, broken only by the occasional sobs of Sapnap or who Phil thought might be Niki. Dream and George were crouched on the floor next to their friend, a show of support and mutual grief.

“I don’t want to hear another big argument right now,” George whispered. “Not when Karl’s right here. It doesn’t feel right.”

“We can do that,” Phil reassured him.

 _Time for another funeral_ , Phil thought.

Skeppy pushed his way through the group. His hands trembled slightly. He leaned over to Sapnap, whispering something in his ear that made the other man nod his head silently, before wrapping an arm around his shoulder in a hug.

Over Sapnap’s shoulder, Phil met Skeppy’s tired and red-rimmed eyes. An understanding was reached in the span of that gaze. Gently, Skeppy murmured something to Sapnap again. He stood up, offering Sapnap a hand up. The younger man took it quietly, before bending down to cradle his friend’s body close to him. Dream reached a hand out as if to offer to take the burden for him, before retracting it back. Phil agreed with that decision. Sapnap did not look as if he’d be willing to part with Karl for a single second.

The funeral march began again. This time, Phil waited for the very end, allowing the trio of Dream, George, and Sapnap to funnel out of the kitchen first, Skeppy trailing behind them. Phil reached an arm out to Tommy – _God, he’s already taller than me, but he’s so young, he shouldn’t have to see all this_ – and held him close as they walked outside once more.

Snow drifted gently downwards as the group made their way out the door. Using the footprints they’d left behind from Bad’s makeshift funeral, Sapnap led them to Karl’s soon-to-be resting place. A similar patch of snow, right next to Bad’s. It was practically indistinguishable from the rest of the landscape.

It didn’t matter. That was all they had. Phil didn’t know how long they’d be stuck here. And, well, it was in best practice to properly put someone to rest. Karl and Bad deserved that, at least, especially after their brutal deaths.

Karl’s, at least, was easier to look at. Where Bad had been bloody and torn, Karl was almost peaceful and serene. There weren’t bloodstains anywhere, no great slashes in his body. Just his neck, tilted and lolling far too distant from its normal position. And the deep blue-purple splotch there. And the lump distending the skin.

Phil didn’t want to think about it, but he knew what that lump was. He shuddered. But he steeled himself, breathing deep and forging through the thick snow to the front of the line right next to Sapnap. “May I?”

Sniffing, Sapnap turned to him. Phil could see the pure devastation on his face, from the trembling of his lower lip to the redness of his misty eyes. “W-” his voice cracked, “What are you doing?”

Phil smiled sadly. “I don’t think it feels right to leave him like this. Can I-?” and here he gestured to Karl’s grotesquely broken neck.

“Sure.”

Gently, oh so gently, Phil grasped Karl’s limp head with one hand and braced himself on his shoulder with another. As he pushed his head back into place, there was a sickeningly muffled scraping noise.

Someone retched behind him. Phil didn’t look back.

He shifted his grip slightly, twisting Karl’s head. With a sound like the crack of a knuckle, Karl’s head returned to a mostly normal position. His skin was still bruise-purple, but Phil couldn’t do anything about that.

“Oh God,” someone gasped.

“Thank you,” Sapnap breathed. He looked a few shades paler, but also somewhat relieved. “I didn’t want him to be like that forever.”

Phil patted him on the shoulder before stepping back. This wasn’t his place anymore.

The digging started again. This time – _God, they were doing it again, how was this real?_ – they knew not to bother trying to hack through the rock-hard dirt. With considerable effort from Dream and George, Sapnap stoically holding Karl close, they cleared out a space next to where Bad was.

Slowly, as if he were afraid to let go – _he probably is_ – Sapnap lowered the corpse into his spot. Dream arranged his arms and slid his eyelids shut. He looked like he was just sleeping. His neck was still purple with burst blood vessels. Phil ignored it. So did everybody else.

There was a moment of expectant silence. As if everybody was waiting for something. A eulogy, or something. When Dream tiled his head questioningly at his friend, Sapnap snapped.

“I just – I – I _can’t_ ,” Sapnap started. “I don’t – I don’t know what I’m supposed to say here. Is there some kind of script for this? For when your best friend gets fucking murdered in some creepy cabin in the middle of the woods by _somebody_ that you thought would be a DECENT FUCKING HUMAN BEING!” He’d rapidly turned from the subdued and grieving man into one fueled by roaring anger. “IS IT TOO MUCH TO ASK FOR ONE OF YOU NOT TO BE A FUCKING SERIAL KILLER?”

No response.

“AND I KNOW IT WAS ONE OF YOU! THERE’S NOBODY ELSE OUT HERE, THERE’S NO OTHER OPTION! COME ON, FESS UP SO THAT I CAN FUCKING WRING YOUR NECK LIKE YOU DID TO – to _him_.”

Again, silence.

A cough. A throat was cleared. And to Phil’s dismay, Techno lifted his head and spoke. “I told you so.”

Sapnap’s head whipped towards him so fast that Phil was half-worried he’d snap his own neck. _Ooh, bad taste, too soon_. “ _What did you say?_ ” Sapnap asked, voice deadly and low.

Phil tried to telepathically tell Techno to stop, that this was a bad idea, but as always, his brother ignored the clear social cues. “I told you so. When Bad was murdered and you all fucked up the crime scene, I said that the next time someone died and we had no idea who was responsible, I’d say ‘I told you so.’ So,” he shrugged, “I told you so.”

Sapnap stood and processed that for a second, two, three. Suddenly, he flew into a biting rage, shouting madly at Technoblade, words so fast and layered over each other that Phil couldn’t understand a bit of it. The intention was clear even without understanding, though. Techno had fucked up.

Dream and George were trying valiantly to hold Sapnap back from full-on decking Techno, grabbing his arms and pinning them to his sides. Neither of them looked happy with Techno’s declaration – from what Phil could see of Dream’s face, at least – but they were doing their best to stop the group from descending into all-out violence.

Spitting and thrashing, they dragged Sapnap back inside, throwing glares over their shoulders all the way.

With Karl’s makeshift grave still open before them, Fundy turned to Techno. “Not cool, man.”

“What?”

Fundy just shook his head, turning and heading back inside after the trio.

Phil looked to Wilbur, who shepherded Tommy and Tubbo after them. The boys had seen enough death for today – for a lifetime, really.

That left Skeppy, Eret, Niki, Techno, and Phil outside with the grim task of filling the grave.

“Does anybody want to say anything before we start?” Phil asked.

Techno stared back at him, face blank. It almost felt like a question in return, as if he were asking Phil why he should say anything at all.

“I’m really sorry this had to happen to you, Karl. You were really nice to me and to everybody, and you didn’t deserve this. We’ll miss you.” Niki wiped her face with the back of her hand.

“Nobody deserves this, Karl. I promise we’ll figure out who did this. For you, for Bad,” said Skeppy.

“Wherever you are, you don’t need to worry, Karl,” Phil added. “I’ll be looking out for your friends. They’ll be okay. We’ll all help them through this.”

They turned expectantly to Eret. He looked a little shocked at the sudden attention. “Uh, sorry, man. This sucks.”

With that lackluster ending – _I thought he was better with words than that_ – the group solemnly began the arduous process of shifting the thick snow back into place. Though it was slightly dirtied by the movement and the ground, the snow still left a pristine and untouched feeling once it was placed over Karl’s body. That was it. The end of another life. Left with nothing but an unmarked burial in a mound of snow in the middle of nowhere.

“Come on, let’s get back inside.”

Returning to the common room – what had become the designated ‘meeting area’ – Phil and his companions found a tense and quiet atmosphere. It was clear that Sapnap’s earlier outburst hadn’t been enough of a release. He sat clenching and releasing his fists, breathing heavily. Phil was half-tempted to hide Techno behind him, but no – this was something the two of them would have to talk out. Phil couldn’t just shelter Techno from the consequences of his actions.

When Sapnap looked up to see Phil’s pink-haired brother entering the room, Phil could practically see the steam stream from his ears. Still, with Dream and George placing placating hands on his back, he took a noisy breath in and exhaled just as loudly. “Technoblade,” he gritted out.

“Hello.”

Apparently, that simple response was too much for Sapnap, because he groaned loudly, tossing his hands up into the air before storming out. Dream and George exchanged worried glances before Dream stood from his seat on the couch, following his friend out. George stayed behind.

The attention of the room returned to Techno.

“Um.” He scratched his arm awkwardly. Phil winced internally. Techno wasn’t always the best at these sorts of social situations, especially with the tension ripe in the air. “So…should we start sleuthing?”

“Oh, _here_ we go!” Fundy commented.

“What? Is this not the logical course of action? We found out nothing last time, and now Karl is dead. We need to figure out who the hell did this so that we can stop another death.”

“Maybe we should be focusing on you, then, huh?” the ginger shot back. “You’ve sure been suspicious.”

“ _How_ have I been suspicious, exactly?”

“Well, for one thing, you’re not in fucking shock over the fact that two people just got murdered!”

“It seems like _someone_ has to fill the rational role here, since being in shock is all the rest of you have done!”

“Oh, _fuck you_!”

“Boys!” Phil shouted, interrupting their sparring match. “Let’s talk this out like _civilized_ people, alright? I don’t think it’s Techno, but please, Fundy, lay out your points. We’ll be polite and organized about this.”

The patrolman sighed. “Thank you, Phil. _As I was saying_ , I think that Technoblade should be our prime suspect here. He’s been very emotionally distant from everything, he knows a lot about murder – _by his own admission!_ – and such, and he was at the scene of the crime for Karl’s death.”

“I agree with Fundy!” Skeppy jumped onto the ginger’s bandwagon. “I said it before we split up, I’ll say it again: Techno is super sus.”

“ _Wow_ , guys, with that flawless logic, I guess it couldn’t be anybody but me,” Techno replied sarcastically. “It’s not like I could refute or explain _each and every one of those points_. None of that is evidence! It’s just like personality traits! Jesus!”

“Uh-huh, sure. That’s what a fucking murderer would say!”

“Um, should we be talking about this when there are kids here?” Niki interjected timidly.

Tommy was immediately indignant. “Hey, I’m not a kid! I’m a man!”

Eret agreed. “I think that Tommy should be here for this.”

Rolling his eyes, Tommy groaned in that way that only teenagers could. “Ugh, you’re not honestly still on about that, are you? _Jesus_ , man, calm down! I didn’t kill anybody! What the hell!”

Eret shrugged. “I’m just saying, both Tommy and Techno were there, and Tommy once again doesn’t have an alibi.”

“Okay, big man, why are you so focused on it being me? Why are you so suspicious of a _literal sixteen-year-old_? Isn’t _that_ suspicious?”

Phil hummed consideringly. “Now that I think about it, Eret, you did leave the room for a few minutes while we were in our groups.”

“See?” Tommy shouted triumphantly. That was maybe a little bit too excited considering they were in the middle of deducing who had killed two people, but what could Phil do to stop him? That was just how Tommy was.

“Wait,” George asked, “Really? I don’t remember him leaving.”

“That’s because you had your head stuck in a book, George,” Phil replied.

“Oh my _God_ , I was in the _bathroom_!”

Tommy eyed him. “Mhm, sure, can anybody confirm that?”

“I – what – nobody came to the bathroom _with me_ , Tommy, what the hell? That would be _weird_.”

“Yeah, sure, totally _not_ what a serial killer would say. Boys, I think I’ve deduced it. Call off the search, we found him!”

“Wait – Tommy, no,” Phil halted that line of conversation. “Just because we have suspicions doesn’t mean that it’s him for sure. Okay?”

“But, Phil, if we don’t do something now, then someone else could _die_!”

“And if we accuse Eret and we’re wrong, then we’re condemning an innocent person. Hell, what do you expect us to do when we find this person? Tie them up and throw them in the cellar? Call the police? _Kill them_?”

“I – but – _Phil_ -” Tommy sputtered.

“We can’t make any final decisions right now, Tommy. Not when everything is too fresh, not when we’re not sure about what we’d even do. We’ll figure this out later, alright?”

“Phil-”

“ _Alright?_ ”

“…alright.”

Dinner was a tense affair. In the time it took to prepare the meal – tensely, nervously, using the fireplace in the common room rather than the kitchen where Karl had died – with Dream and Niki, Phil had heard the start and abrupt end of two different arguments.

Where had the easygoing atmosphere of their initial meeting gone?

_That’s not a hard question to answer._

_Shut up_ , Phil reprimanded his brain. _This is not the time_.

With a makeshift stew composed of melted snow and various bits of scavenged meat and produce from the cellar, dinner wasn’t as decadent and joyful as their pancake-filled breakfast. The couches were packed close, each little unit grouped together.

Dream and his pack seemed to have adopted Skeppy into the fold. He and Sapnap hunched together, supporting each other through their grief. Dream and George pushed them to the center of their couch, offering wordless comfort.

The clinking of metal spoons on ceramic bowls accentuated the dim murmurs from the small groups. Phil was half-reminded of lunchroom cliques back in high school – _how long ago was that now?_ – though there certainly wasn’t a looming existential dread over his head back then. The cluster of patrollers huddled close, whispering viciously, though too quiet and distant for Phil to pick out what they were saying.

From his own little family unit, Wilbur was trying his best to calm everyone down. He’d grabbed the guitar from the night previous and started strumming again. His crowd was nowhere near as receptive as the first night, but Wilbur played on, humming softly. It was peaceful, Phil knew his brother had talent, but regrettably, it wasn’t enough.

Techno leaned over to Phil. “So, um, are we going to be doing _any_ sleuthing or am I just gonna be Cassandra over here?”

Out of the corner of his mouth, Phil hissed, “I don’t think this is the time, Techno.”

“Come _on_ , Phil. You’re just gonna sit back and let this happen again?”

“What I’m going to do is be supportive of our friends that are _grieving_.”

“I mean, first of all, I’m not sure how much I trust them to be our friends right now, considering this whole,” he gestured vaguely, “situation. Secondly, while they sit there and mope, someone else is gonna die, and then they’ll be even sadder. Really, doing this kind of thing is the only proactive course of action.”

“Okay, Techno? I understand your reasoning here, really, I do. But there are emotions that you’ve got to factor in. We can’t just press a button and suddenly be fine. They’re processing right now, and even if they were going and playing detective, I’m not sure how helpful they’d be. Let them work it out.”

“Sure,” Techno hmphed, turning back to his bowl of stew.

That about summarized how dinner went. Tense, quiet, uncertain. Since Phil, Niki, and Dream had made the food, the rest of the group came to the unanimous decision that the rest would be on dish duty. As the band of nine clustered off to the kitchen – _hope that goes well for Sapnap_ – Phil started setting everything up to bed down for the night. With the fire crackling merrily in the fireplace behind him, the common room felt like the one safe place in this mansion. Niki and Dream by his side, they laid out blankets and borrowed pillows from couches to properly set everyone a place. They didn’t know how long they’d be stuck, Phil figured he might as well help make everyone comfortable for a while.

It was warm, the sky was pitch-black, and his brothers were all alive, popping through the doorframe back into the living room. There was a murderer hidden amongst the dozen stranded wanderers, but that was a problem for tomorrow. Phil yawned.

With a faint knot of uneasiness in his stomach outweighed by the warm stew, Phil drifted off to sleep.

With grey-tinged light settling over his face, Tommy groaned and rubbed his eyes. He’d slept like the dead last night, a combination of emotional exhaustion and actual sickness – _dumb fucking cold_ – knocking him out like a light.

Sitting up, Tommy blinked bleary eyes and gazed around the room. Bodies were strewn across the floor, everybody still asleep at the probably-early hour. Honestly, Tommy didn’t know what time it was. His phone was dead and he hadn’t seen a clock or watch anywhere. He was just kind of following the flow of the rest of the group.

Still, nobody was up, and he was already bored. He considered getting Tubbo up, but that probably wouldn’t end well. His friend never liked being up early; he got grumpy, like he was a whole different person. Like, seriously, Tommy had made the mistake of disturbing his sleep, like, twice, and he’d never done it again. He had resolved to never speak of what had happened, and Tubbo’s early-morning mind hadn’t remembered. Which was for the best.

Wilbur or Techno? Nah. Wilbur had been up late doing shit with his new-old guitar, and Techno got little enough sleep with his insomnia that Tommy knew not to wake him up. That would just be mean, and Tommy was not a mean person. Honestly!

He didn’t know anybody else well enough to risk waking them up and maybe getting yelled at. Besides, what would he talk about with these total strangers, especially ones who’d just lost a friend? Yeah, no, Tommy had his limits.

Which left Phil. He wouldn’t yell at Tommy, probably. It was a better option than just sitting and doing nothing for ages. Shrugging, Tommy clambered to his feet and shuffled over to his brother, who was lying on his side, facing away from him.

“Hey, Phil.” He nudged his back with his sock-clad foot. No response. “Phil.” Still nothing.

Tommy sighed. Clearly, the gentle foot-nudging (not kicking! He wasn’t kicking him!) strategy wasn’t working. “God, Phil, you’re so old. You’re sleeping in like an old, old man.” Crouching, Tommy started shaking Phil’s shoulder. Absolutely no response. What was up with Phil? “Come on, Phil, wake up. I’m bored. Wake up.”

Normally, Phil would have been awake by now. Normally, Phil would have sat up and started scolding him jokingly for disturbing his beauty sleep. Normally, Tommy wouldn’t have this pit of dread in his stomach.

“Phil?” He started shaking him more vigorously. Like dead weight, Phil flopped over, finally face up.

His lips were blue.

He wasn’t moving. “Phil?”

There was no steady rise and fall of Phil’s chest. His eyes weren’t opening. His hand was cold to the touch.

As Tommy looked closer, he spotted a faint trail of red descending from Phil’s ear.

“Come on, Phil, this isn’t funny,” Tommy repeated. This had to be a joke, right? Come on, it was _Phil_ , he’d be fine, right?

Phil didn’t wake up.

“Phil!”

Tommy’s rapidly more frantic shouts woke the room with a start. Wilbur and Techno slid over immediately, worry clear on their faces. Tommy looked to his brothers helplessly. “He won’t wake up! Techno, Wil, do something!”

Wilbur laid his head on Phil’s unmoving chest. He waited. One second. Ten. Thirty. A minute.

With tears in his eyes, he lifted his head back up and pulled Tommy into a hug. “Wil, _please_ , I-”

Tommy didn’t know where he was going with that sentence. He let it drop dead in the air. And, _oh, can’t make dead jokes anymore, can I?_

Techno curled around them. With his brothers on every side – _and one dead on the ground in front of him, how?_ – Tommy huddled into their embrace and shook apart.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Itaque hesterno die belli erat interesting. 
> 
> Non est bonum hoc interpres.


	6. Grant, Washington and Kennedy; Just Off Meridian

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> These chapters are becoming progressively longer and I don't know how to feel about that.

“I – I don’t understand. Why’d it have to be _Phil_?” Tommy sobbed into his brother’s chest. People were looking at him, he could _feel_ their eyes on him, and normally he would care. Normally he wouldn’t let himself break down like this in front of other people; he’d play himself off as fine, crack a few jokes and divert the attention, then fall apart later. But Phil was dead. His oldest brother, the sane one of their family, the rock they’d all leaned on, was gone forever. So Tommy thought he could forgive himself for his emotional breakdown.

Wilbur leaned into him just as hard, pressing into his brother. Tommy was half-tempted to think that Wil was confirming that Tommy was still alive, that he hadn’t lost him like he’d lost Phil. He couldn’t begrudge him that.

From behind him, he felt Technoblade tense up. In a flurry of movement, he removed himself from their little huddle, pushing to his feet. Tommy couldn’t see what exactly Techno was doing, not with his face hidden in Wilbur’s sweater as it was, but he could practically taste the aura of anger surrounding his brother. Techno was furious, and everyone around them was about to face his wrath.

“SO,” Tommy’s brother roared, “WAS I RIGHT OR WAS I RIGHT? HUH?”

Tommy burrowed closer to Wilbur. He felt a new pair of arms wrap around him and turned his head just enough to pick out that it was Tubbo. At least his best friend was offering his support.

“I TOLD YOU ALL THAT WE HAD TO FIGURE OUT WHO IT WAS. THAT IT WASN’T GOING TO STOP. AND LOOK WHAT HAPPENED. LOOK.” Tommy felt a rush of air past his head, Techno’s hand inches from hitting his ear as he presumably pointed at Phil.

“Look, man,” someone said. Fundy? Maybe? “We fucked up. We know this! And I’m sorry. I’m really, really sorry.”

Tommy heard a faint scoff to his right. He looked up to see Sapnap, pale but sneering slightly.

Techno’s rage now had a new target. “Anything you want to contribute, Snapchat?”

Sapnap seemed a bit taken aback by the sudden attention, but he opened his mouth. Mistake. “I’m just thinking, it serves you right.”

“You wanna repeat that?” Techno asked, voice suddenly deadly calm.

“Well, now you know how the rest of us feel.” Another mistake.

The pink-haired man surged forwards, grabbing Sapnap by the collar of his shirt and slamming him into one of the precarious towers placed around the room. Tommy watched the top of it wobble dangerously. “Do you think this is a fucking _joke_?”

“Of course not, bitch, I just lost my best friend!”

“AND I JUST LOST MY BROTHER!”

“Okay, guys, let’s not fight,” Fundy tried to soothe. His eyes were trained on the unsteady box at the top of the tower.

Both heads swiveled to face him with unerring accuracy. Fundy shrunk back under the combined weight of their fiery glares.

“And what gives you the right to talk, dickhead?” Sapnap asked. “Your group seems remarkably untouched. That seems suspicious, doesn’t it?”

“W-what?”

“I’m just saying.”

“I’m just trying to get you two to stop fighting before you get hurt!”

“Oh, it’s far too late for that,” Techno rumbled. “You see, I was just about to kick this child’s ass into oblivion.”

“I’d like to see you try,” Sapnap goaded.

As Techno added more pressure to his hold on Sapnap, readjusting his grip and rearing back to punch him, Tommy watched in alarm as the top of the tower finally collapsed, toppling to the ground and forcing the two arguing men to split apart before they were crushed.

There was a shattering noise. Shards of glass spread across the floor. One particularly large piece of glass, wickedly jagged, stuck into the space between floorboards right where Techno and Sapnap had been arguing just moments before.

Silence. _Holy shit._

Techno and Sapnap exchanged unsteady glances, breathing out shakily. Tommy could see they came to the moment of unspoken resolution. Sapnap ran a hand through his hair as his friends rushed to his side, fussing over and quietly reprimanding him. Techno strode back over to Tommy and Wilbur.

With a look in his eyes that spoke volumes about the emotional turmoil he was going through, Techno knelt down next to his brothers. Wordless for once in his life, Tommy reached out a hand and grasped Techno’s. He squeezed it. Techno squeezed back.

“I really hate to ask this of you two, but I have to. Can we – can we hold off on burying Phil? Just until we figure out more about what happened?”

Oh god, a Techno who was trying this hard was one that was hard to say no to. Tommy exhaled deeply before nodding.

“Thank you.”

“No problem, man.”

Still holding his brother’s hand tightly, Techno turned to the body of their brother. He turned Phil’s head to the side with more care than Tommy had ever seen. Techno’s hands were ones that had seen many a fight, bruised from back-alley brawls. Wilbur’s were usually the careful ones, practiced from picking tunes on his guitar. To see Wil so shaky and Techno so soft was the opposite of Tommy’s normal. But then, so was this entire fucking situation. _God, what he’d give to find out this was all a nightmare._

Phil’s lips were blue and bloodless, his skin pale and cold. His eyes were still closed, looking peaceful and unbothered. He could just be sleeping, like Tommy had first thought, except for the blood.

The thin trail of blood descending from Phil’s ear wasn’t the only stain on his face, though. Upon closer inspection, at a slightly different angle, still coming from his ear, was a faint yellowish fluid, partially congealed.

Tommy had no idea what it was. From the look of confusion on Techno’s face, neither did he.

“Can I see?” Tubbo asked, speaking up for the first time in a while. “It – it’s just, y’know, I was trained for this sort of thing, kind of. And, well,” he jerked his head towards the others, who were either looking away from the quiet scene or already gone, “I’m the only one here who _would_ know, I guess. The rest of the Ski Patrol has kinda already gone on to other things.”

“Go right ahead.”

Tubbo shuffled closer, taking Techno’s place next to Phil’s head. Tommy watched, half-interested and _hating_ himself for that fact, as his best friend flicked some sort of internal switch and started chattering as he examined Tommy’s _dead brother’s body_.

“So, I guess what I’m basically looking for is what symptoms I can still pick out since, y’know, he’s kind of already – um. Yeah. Which makes this a bit harder, but we can do some base eliminations right now, I guess. It’s probably a poison of some kind, since there’s that extra little trail of something and no signs of like bruising or stabbing that I can see from here. We might want to check his chest, though, see if there was something that hit him, but I doubt it. Why would the killer also have put something in his ear if he was already dead? I don’t know.” Tubbo was picking up steam as he went, his words getting faster and more confident. “So I’m saying it’s a poison we’re looking for, and probably a plant of some kind, since we’re way up here and isolated in the mountains. It’s kind of hard to get a different kind of poison if we’re snowed in. Though! It could be that the killer brought poison with them when they came up here. Which, weird, since none of us expected to get snowed in here, so. I’m just going to guess based on plants. It’s winter, we’re up in the mountains, which narrows our options considerably! So that’s good! Um, the trail is kinda yellowish? So I think that it came from some kind of green plant, probably a leaf. I noticed a few plants around here as we came in, and like, only one of them could be really poisonous? And it kind of matches the symptoms I can see, like the blue lips. So, I think it was yew? That was like crushed up and then poured into his ear!” Tubbo lifted his hands up in celebration of his deduction, accidentally dropping Phil’s head to the floor in the process. It bounced with a heavy _thunk_. “Um. Oops.”

Tommy’s lips quirked involuntarily, though that was about all he could muster up at the moment. At least Tubbo was lifting his mood a little bit. It was weird and kind of unsettling to see his best friend dissect his brother’s death like that, but, well. At least they knew more, right?

“Poison in the ear?” Wilbur questioned. “That sounds a little too Shakespearian for my tastes.”

Tommy and Tubbo looked at him blankly.

“Come on, Shakespeare? _Hamlet_? It’s only one of the most famous plays in existence?”

Tommy had no idea how Hamlet related, but whatever. Techno nodded along, apparently getting whatever reference Wil was making. Tommy would leave that to those two nerds.

“So, do we have any other evidence?” Techno asked.

Wilbur shook his head. “I guess we could look around the room, but we were all asleep, and the glass and everything falling probably hid any traces we might have found. I think that’s a dead-end, Techno.”

The man in question leaned over into one of the couch cushions and groaned.

“Ey, Big Man, I don’t think I’d put my face there if I were you. Who knows what’s been there? Rats, bugs, Sapnap’s ass?”

Techno groaned again, though this time for entirely different reasons. He lifted his head up to glare at Tommy. _Always satisfying to annoy the Blade. Job well done, Tommy._

“Going forward, we should probably have, like, watch shifts during the night. So that this doesn’t happen again.”

“Tubbo, that is an _excellent_ idea.”

“Ey, nice thinking, Big T,” Tommy complimented, though without his usual excitement. Tubbo was understanding, though. Tubbo would get it, and he’d know that Tommy meant the comment as much as ever.

Tubbo smiled.

Though Dream, George, and Sapnap were gone to who-knows-where, the remaining members of the Ski Patrol (plus Skeppy) were all still in the common room. Niki and Eret had taken up the task of sweeping up glass shards while Fundy and Skeppy were trying to reorganize the still-standing towers to be slightly less of a hazard. With a quick handwave from Tubbo, all four abandoned those tasks to come gather with the rest of the group.

“So,” Techno started.

“So,” Skeppy echoed.

A tense moment of silence.

Skeppy broke first. He rubbed his neck. “I – I’m sorry, man. You wouldn’t have done this, not to your own brother. A-and I want you to know that I don’t agree with what Sapnap said. You didn’t deserve this. None of you did.”

“Neither did you.” Wilbur reached out a consoling hand, rubbing slow circles onto Skeppy’s arm. “We’re all here to support each other, okay?”

With a watery smile, Skeppy nodded. “Okay.”

“We’re here for you guys too” Niki chimed in. “We – we may not have lost anybody in our group, but we all need to stick together through this.”

“About that…”

Heads swiveled to Techno at his sudden change in tone. “You guys are all really nice, but – well. We need to figure out who the hell is killing our friends and family, and soon. And, well, no offense, but you _are_ the only group still intact and untouched. Which kind of makes you all prime suspects. Nothing personal, I guess, but. Um. Yeah.” He quieted down, turning his head so his long hair obscured his face.

Techno struggled a lot with social interaction, Tommy’s childhood with him could attest to that, and that awkwardness was on full display here. He’d been trying his best here, but Techno’s determination to solve the mystery ahead of everybody’s emotions had worked against him. Tommy didn’t blame him a bit, didn’t suspect him for one second, and he was proud of his brother’s effort. He’d give Techno a break from doing the talking. Tommy was the one who thrived on attention, so he’d live up to his duty as the youngest sibling and demand everyone focus on him.

“Techno’s right. I can’t – losing Phil _hurts_ , like so fucking much that you wouldn’t even believe, and I don’t want that to happen again. I don’t know what I’d do if the next one gone was Wilbur or Techno or Tubbo. So we need to figure out the bitch who did this, as soon as we possibly can.”

Niki glanced at her patrol mates. “I get what you’re feeling, really, I do. But I can’t think that any of us would have done this. I mean you three,” and here she gestured to Tommy and his brothers, “are clearly in a lot of pain after losing Phil. Same for Skeppy with Bad. But the four of us are in the Ski Patrol. We signed up to _save_ lives, not take them. I trust my partners with my life!”

“But the killer apparently knows how poison works,” Tommy pointed out. “I mean, Tubbo, who’s the youngest one of you, was able to find out what happened to Phil just by looking at him and knowing the area. Who’s to say the rest of you can’t?”

 _Point to me,_ Tommy thought.

“Tubbo figured it out?” Fundy asked.

“Um, yeah.” Tubbo picked at the hem of his shirt. “I’m pretty sure they poisoned him with yew in his ear.”

“That seems very Shakespeare to me,” Eret commented.

“That’s what I said!”

Tommy interrupted before those two could get into their nerd talk about books and shit. “Alright, so let’s get our shit in order. What do we know about this bitch?”

“They’re strong.”

“They know the area and plants and poisons.”

“They have good handwriting, I guess?”

“Tubbo, write these down,” Tommy directed.

By the end of their planning session, the eight of them had a list of evidence that looked something like this:

_evedince:_

_-strong_

_-know area + plants + posion_

_-nice handwriting_

_-sneky_

_-y do they have so many wepons?_

_-know the house_

_-ppl who sneak away maybe?_

_-might have been more evedince with bad but idk_

_-likes food? said not to touch lefotvers_

_-shakespear reference by killing phil?_

_-this is not enough information_

And indeed, just like Tubbo’s list said, they had nowhere near enough concrete evidence to pick out whoever was killing their friends. Tommy was still suspicious of Eret – _who keeps accusing a sick child of being a serial killer? Plus, the last person to die had revealed incriminating evidence about him_ – but he kept that to himself for now. He didn’t want to start a fight, not when it had been so nearly disastrous only – god, was that already two hours ago? – a short while ago for Techno and Sapnap. The teen liked to boast about his skill in a fight, but he didn’t actually want to start something. Especially not with a potential murderer.

So as Sapnap, Dream, and George walked back in, with snow dusting their shoulders and reddened noses, the group tabled their discussion and moved on to a new task: finding a new place to sleep. They all wanted to stick together, out of the paranoia that being alone could spell their deaths, but the common room was currently a minefield of glass shards and precarious towers. And Tommy really didn’t feel comfortable sleeping right next to where his older brother had been murdered. It felt wrong – not quite like disrespecting Phil, but kind of like – like ignoring the sign that his murder had been? If that made sense? Tommy was still trying to make sense of his thoughts. He wasn’t really sure of what he was feeling, just that there was a deep knot in his stomach at the thought of spending the night in the common room again.

Once again, the group went with the tried-and-true method of exploring the house: go in groups and don’t be alone, _ever_. Tommy wasn’t sure why they kept switching up who went where, but he wasn’t complaining about the people he went with. In a group with Skeppy, who would understand what he was going through right now, with the added benefit of having apologized to his brother; and Tubbo, who was Tommy’s best friend and the best choice there was for cheering Tommy up. Wilbur and Techno stayed together, taking Niki and Fundy with them. And that left Eret, Dream, Sapnap, and George together.

“So we’re all agreed?” George clarified. “We’re all heading different directions, looking for a big room, hopefully with sheets and blankets we can use. It’s got to have space for all eleven of us to fit together – extra points if there’s like a bathroom or something next to it.”

At everybody’s nods, he hopped down from the coffee table again – _what is it with George and standing on things? Is he trying to compensate for his height? Hah, shorty_ – and shouted, “Alright, break!”

Tommy and the rest of his trio split off down a hall to the right of the window, following a long and meandering hallway. With the dimly flickering candles in their hands doing little to light up the dark and windowless corridor, it was a cautious and slow pace. A hush fell over the three of them as if they were afraid that speaking would summon the mysterious murderer to their location. Or at least, that’s how Tommy felt.

The only sound Tommy could hear was the quiet breathing of his friends and the creaking of the aging floorboards beneath their feet. Tubbo and Skeppy’s faces were illuminated with orange, throwing sharp shadows upwards on their faces from the angles of the candles. From his place at the head of their little group, Skeppy started spluttering.

“What? What’s wrong?” Tubbo asked, immediately concerned.

Blinking rapidly, Skeppy dropped his candle and swiped at his face. “Ah, FUCK, cobwebs!”

Tommy started laughing despite himself. Here they were, facing their possible deaths and the deaths of their friends, and yet the biggest problem at the moment was the fear of running headfirst into a spiderweb. His laughter continued, echoing loudly down the hallway, and it kept going until Tommy started having trouble breathing and it turned from laughter to sobs, tears rolling down his face as he struggled to inhale properly.

_What – what the fuck?_

The tears didn’t stop either, even though Tommy swiped at them viciously. _Come on, he’d had his little cry earlier, he should be fine now! He’s fine!_

“Tommy?” Tubbo ventured cautiously.

He tried to respond to his friend, but his throat felt like he’d swallowed glass and his mouth wasn’t working right and his nose was stuffy and his eyes were leaking and _he’s not okay, he’s not okay at all_.

Slowly, shakily, Tommy sunk to the floor, holding a hand to his mouth like that would stop the sobs. Tubbo dropped to his knees next to him, quickly pulling him into a hug and letting Tommy cry into his shoulder. _God, he feels like he’s fucking five again. Like when he fell and broke his arm and Phil was the first one there and he hugged him and – and – and he misses him._ He sobbed harder.

“I miss him, Tubbo. I miss him so fucking much.”

He didn’t receive a response, but then, what was Tubbo supposed to say here?

He felt Skeppy’s hand on his shoulder and looked up from where his face was squished into Tubbo’s shoulder.

The look on Skeppy’s face was heartbreaking. His cheeks were dry, but his eyes were watery and it looked exactly how Tommy felt and _god, that’s because he feels exactly how Tommy feels._

Tommy moved aside and opened up an arm for Skeppy to join their little pile on the floor.

That was all the signal Skeppy needed to shuffle into their embrace. All three of them – _all too fucking young for this_ – sat there for a while, mourning together. Tommy took reassurance from Skeppy’s complete understanding of what he was feeling, and he took strength from Tubbo’s nonjudgmental support. Slowly, Tommy’s sobs quieted and his lungs started working again.

He sniffed loudly. “Right. Well then.” Another sniff. _God, he needs a tissue_. “I propose we get a move on and pretend this never happened. All in favor?”

“Aw, Tommy, you just don’t want us to think you have emotions.”

“Shut the fuck up, Tubbo, I am a massive man who feels nothing but anger and hate. And occasionally satisfaction.”

“Mhmm, sure.”

“If that’s what you want us to think, but we’ll all know the truth.”

“I hate you both.”

After a moment or two of standing around (collecting themselves), the trio continued along their course. Skeppy’s candle was lost to the darkness, so with only two small lights instead of three, they huddled even closer together, moving forwards like they were tied together and competing in the world’s slowest three-legged race.

When the hallway finally opened up again, widening to an odd sort of room that had doors branching off every wall, the easy sort of silence that had emerged from their man talk – _it was totally a manly talk, not an emotional rollercoaster full of tears, definitely not_ – fell apart. While Tommy and Tubbo wanted to stick together – _strength in numbers, Big Man_ – Skeppy thought it was about time they split off.

“Come on, guys. It’s only us here. I trust you two!”

“Skeppy, this is exactly what happened with Karl! He left for like a second, and then that was it for him!”

“But that was in the kitchen, Tommy. Everybody knows how to get there. Nobody knows where we are!”

“I don’t know, man. I’d rather be safe than sorry, you know?”

“Fine,” Skeppy acquiesced. “Which door are we taking?”

Tommy could practically feel Skeppy’s reluctance, but he’d take what he could get. So long as they were together, they were safe. Hesitantly, Tommy opened the door directly across from where they’d entered. Inside it was another hallway, venturing even further into the house. He sighed.

“Damn, this place really is a maze, isn’t it?” Tubbo commented.

“Really, I hadn’t noticed.”

“Like, who would build a house like this?” It seemed that Tubbo was ignoring Tommy’s very reasonable sarcasm. “It doesn’t make sense. Also, how did it get built here? Like, you’d have to hire someone for this, right? It seems like the kind of thing you’d get haunted for.”

“Oh, right! There’s a place kinda like this in America, actually. It’s called the Winchester House, and it’s totally haunted.”

Tommy turned to Skeppy, an eyebrow raised. “Are you implying that our killer here is a ghost?”

“Well, no. Actually, maybe? I don’t know. I don’t think so? But I wouldn’t be surprised. If that makes sense?”

“No, no, I get you!” Tubbo nodded along.

Silence descended again, this time somewhat awkward. How does one pick up that thread of conversation? Tommy certainly didn’t know, and he was the best at conversating. Talking. Whatever. “Um, door number two, I guess?”

Door number two ended up being a closet. That was it. There wasn’t even anything in it! Just a few empty hangers and a thick layer of dust.

The third door was a bathroom. Which was a good sign! Hopefully, there’d be like a bedroom or something nearby.

But every other door in that room was useless and led nowhere. Closets, bathrooms, tiny little rooms; it felt like everything except for the one kind of room that fit their specifications.

Which left them looking back at the hallway. That pathway even further into the winding, twisting house that made no sense. Really, Tommy was going to have words with whoever thought that building this place was a good idea. Someone needed to smack some sense into them and stop them from making another murder mansion in the future.

“Once more unto the breach!” Tubbo quipped.

Tommy and Skeppy looked at him, Tommy’s hand stopping from where it was grabbing the door handle. “What?” they asked at the same time.

Tubbo shrugged. “I don’t know, I heard someone say it once and I thought it sounded cool.”

“Makes sense.”

“Fine by me, man!”

And with that, Tommy opened the door and they started down the next hallway.

More darkness and doorways greeted them. They all groaned in unison. One by one, they started opening doors, peeking inside, finding nothing, and moving on. It descended into a monotonous rhythm. Open door, look, close door. Open, look, close. Over and over. Tommy’s boredom was unmatched.

It was what felt like hours later – _it probably wasn’t, but it felt like it_ – when Tubbo’s voice broke through Tommy’s boredom. “You do realize that Skeppy wandered off, like, five minutes ago, right?”

Pulled from the haziness of repetition, Tommy blinked. He looked around. No Gucci sweatshirt or black hair in sight. “Huh.”

“I take it you hadn’t noticed?”

“Nope.”

“I hope he’s okay.”

“Eh, he’s fine, probably off to go murder someone.”

Tubbo looked at him concernedly. “You really think so?”

“No, not really.” Tommy trailed off. How to word this? “I – well I don’t think that after everything earlier, y’know, that he’d do that. I’d say I trust him at this point.”

“Well that’s nice.”

“Yeah.”

They continued on for a little bit, opening more doors that felt identical in Tommy’s mind.

“I’m gonna go check on him,” Tubbo said suddenly.

“Are you sure?” Tommy asked, not without a little desperation. Sure, he’d bonded with Skeppy earlier, but he knew that Skeppy could take care of himself. But Tubbo leaving on his own? _And Tommy being left on his own as a result?_

Tubbo was already turning back down the hall, presumably in the direction Skeppy had gone. “Yep!”

“Alright. But, um, don’t worry about me! I’ll be alright! But don’t be too long, eh Tubbo?”

“I won’t!”

Tubbo disappeared into the darkness, leaving Tommy alone with his single small candle. _Great._

With only the doors he was speed-dating as company, Tommy was already lonely. He opened a few more, halfheartedly checking through them again, though he still had no luck. He didn’t even know how to quantify what was behind each at this point. He was only categorizing ‘works’ and ‘doesn’t work’. The failure category was very popular today.

A sudden creak.

Tommy swiveled to face it, holding his candle out like he was fucking Ebenezer Scrooge in that one Christmas movie. “Hello?”

No response. No more creaks.

He tried again. “Hello? Answer me, dickhead?”

Still silence. Then, another creak, this time to his left.

“Alright, yeah no, that’s it. I’m outta here! So long, ghost or whoever the fuck you are! Bye, bitch!”

Tommy practically sprinted back the way he’d come, shouting for Tubbo all the way. He couldn’t hear a response from his friend, so he was left hoping that he’d left the door open in whichever room he’d gone in and that Tommy hadn’t already passed it.

A faint light from an open door. Hope. “Tubbo!”

He still didn’t hear anything in return, but Tommy ran inside anyway. He skidded to a stop, his candle no longer necessary thanks to the grey light streaming through the room’s window. In what appeared to be a bedroom, a big one, was Tubbo, silent and face ashen.

And Tubbo was standing over Skeppy, whose hands were tied behind his back with a silver string and whose lips were blue and whose throat was distended and lumpy. His face was frozen in an expression of fear.

“Tubbo, what?”

Tubbo whirled to face him, his hands shaking and reaching out to him. He fell into Tommy’s arms. “Tommy, you’ve gotta believe me, it wasn’t me, I didn’t do this, I came in here and he was like this, Tommy please!”

“Tubbo – I – Tubbo what happened?”

He wailed. “I came in here to check on Skeppy and he was _dead_!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm very sorry about the manner of this death. It's quite brutal, but it's how I thought it'd best fit.
> 
> You'll see soon.


	7. It Goes Like This, the Fourth, the Fifth

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Magpie season in Australia scares me.

Niki was just poking her head into a closet in whatever number bedroom they were in, having spotted something grey out of the corner of her eye, when Tommy stumbled into the room, all flailing limbs and hurried aura. Tubbo appeared behind him, face sheet-white and eyes huge, and immediately she abandoned her task to rush over to the boys.

When she gathered Tubbo into her arms, he was shaking, minute tremors running up and down his arms. Making eye-contact with Wilbur – who was embracing Tommy – over the teen’s head, she saw the same immediate dread she felt reflected back at her.

There was only one reason that people in this house would show such fear.

And she didn’t see Skeppy with them.

From his brother’s embrace, Tommy stuttered out, “Wilbur – Skeppy – h-he – and Tubbo! – it was only a few minutes – but he – and then – you’ve gotta come with us, Wil.” He twisted out of Wilbur’s grasp, grabbing his wrist and dragging him back out the door. In a similar flurry of movement, Tubbo started pulling Niki along, clearly distressed. He hadn’t said a word, just shook silently in her arms, but he followed closely after his friend.

As she was pulled out the door, she looked to Fundy and Techno, their groupmates, and mouthed, “Get help.”

The last glimpse she got of that room was Techno’s resolute nod before she was whisked around the corner behind Tubbo.

Down hallways and through corridors they ran, Tommy not pausing for a second at his brother’s worried inquiries. Neither of the two adults knew what was going on, not for certain, but Niki’s instincts were blaring a warning to her. Skeppy wasn’t with the teens, and they’d made it very clear that nobody was to be left alone. Hell, the group of two that Tommy and Tubbo had run to them in was a risk already! Hopefully, Techno and Fundy would both be okay in that similar size; Niki trusted Fundy implicitly, and she couldn’t be suspicious of Technoblade following Phil’s loss. They’d both be fine.

They had to be.

Tommy’s steps were sure ahead of her, his path certain. He knew where he was going, which meant this wasn’t a case of a missing man like Bad’s had been. Niki’s heart sunk further in her chest, a deep pit forming in her stomach.

They came to an open room full of doors. Tommy didn’t even pause for a second before rushing through the door directly in front of them. It only led to another hallway full of doors, most of them ajar. Tommy pulled them to one a fair distance down the hall. A faint thread of light spilled out of it, but Niki was too worried to properly appreciate the brightness.

Inside the door was a bedroom of some sort – maybe the master? There were too many bedrooms to tell – with white walls and an offset alcove and window from which the sunlight emanated. A closet shot off from opposite the window, a bed placed simply between them. There was a desk on the same wall as the door they entered from. A bright blue painting sat above the bed; not hung, sat. It was simple, aesthetically clean, and it would have been equally clean physically if not for the body that laid askew on the floor, halfway draped onto the bed.

Skeppy was dead, of that there was no doubt in Niki’s mind. His lips and face were blue-tinted, his throat distended, and his legs stretched out awkwardly in front of him. His arms were pinned behind his back, and when Niki leaned closer to investigate, she quickly realized that they were tied there, wrists rubbed raw, by a slender guitar wire. Could this be from one of the many guitars around the house? She remembered finding a whole room of them with Eret and Tubbo when they’d first been looking for Bad, before they’d realized what a nightmare they’d stumbled into. Had that really only been yesterday? Yesterday?

Tubbo whimpered behind her, and from the corner of her eye, she watched him grab Tommy’s shirt hem and hold on tight. _Poor kid._

She grimaced at the gruesome task she now faced. She hated it, hated it so much, but for the good of everybody in this house, she had to figure out how the innocent man in front of her had died. She had seniority of the Ski Patrol members present, she had more first aid training than Wilbur, and Tubbo and Tommy both looked like they were seconds from their knees giving out beneath them.

Mentally shaking herself, Niki shuffled closer to Skeppy and started probing his cold throat. Immediately she felt something hard and pointy beneath the skin. The edge was dulled from the layers between it and her fingers, but there was something there. Something large.

“I – I think he choked,” she reported.

“Choked? On what?” Wilbur asked, tone uncertain but voice steady.

“Not sure. Do – do you want me to find out?”

“I think that’d be best, yes.”

“You might want to close your eyes for this bit,” Niki called behind her, already shifting Skeppy’s body to lay fully on the ground. She quickly unwound the guitar string from his hands, moving them to his sides and ignoring their limpness. She shifted to his side and started chest compressions.

“Isn’t that what you do on a living person? Is he alive?” Tommy piped up hopefully.

Without turning from her task, Niki shook her head. “He’s not Tommy, I’m sorry.” She’d flipped the switch in her head that turned her thoughts clinical, distancing her emotions from the situation. They wouldn’t help now. “I’m doing this to try to dislodge whatever’s in his throat.”

After thirty compressions, she tilted his head back and tried massaging his throat, coaxing the object upwards. It was too large and wedged in place; chest compressions alone wouldn’t work. Slowly, ever so slowly, she felt it start to shift beneath her ministrations. Nik turned back to the compressions.

Another thirty. Still stuck. More manual shifting.

Rinse and repeat.

It took ten numb minutes of repeating this process before Niki was finally able to see some results. This time, when she tilted Skeppy’s head back, she opened his mouth, able to spot a glint of something shiny in his throat. She prodded the underside of his jaw and watched it move closer to freedom. It was so close, so close! Niki turned his head back and moved onto the chest compressions again.

Finally, she felt a miniscule _whoomph_ as whatever it was came fully free. Hands trembling slightly from the exertion, Niki carefully opened Skeppy’s mouth. She gasped at what she saw. Quickly, she covered her hand in her shirt and reached in to grab it.

From the throat of her dead friend had come a beautifully gleaming diamond, sparkling in the weak sunlight. The edges were a bit reddened and bloody, but it was a gorgeous gem. Why would somebody have done this? Of all the ways to murder someone – and Niki had been exposed to far too many for a lifetime in a few short days – why choke them with a diamond? Where would they have even gotten a diamond this big?

It was slightly oval-shaped, just over three and a half centimeters along its longer side, a little bit under that size on the shorter end. It shone brilliantly in the dim light, casting rainbow reflections along Niki’s hand, but she was too sickened to appreciate the beauty.

Just as she was holding it up higher to the various noises of shock from her audience, everybody else rushed into the room with them. Fundy and Techno had found the rest, by the looks of it.

It was probably a somewhat off-putting sight to come into a room expecting a murder and finding a murder and a diamond, but most of them seemed to take it in stride. Dream quickly moved to Niki’s side, looking to her for the prognosis. She only shook her head. Techno ignored the most-likely-very-expensive gem and instead glided over to comfort his brothers, and by extension Tubbo, who was very pointedly not leaving Tommy’s side.

Sapnap and George soon followed Dream’s lead after standing in the doorway for a few moments, obviously taken aback.

Eret remained there for a while, jaw hanging open and hands immobile at his sides. When Fundy looked at him questioningly from his place behind Niki’s shoulder, he shook himself and pointed accusingly at the diamond in Niki’s hand. “Is no one else noticing that?” When everybody looked at him blankly, he furthered his point: “Is that not one of the goddamn _Crown Jewels themselves_?”

“I’m sorry, Eret, but how do you know that?” Dream asked.

“I’m British.”

“So am I,” Wilbur shouted, “but you don’t see me knowing that!”

“I’m studying International Relations; I feel like I should know this sort of thing!” Eret shot back just as aggressively. The tension in the room shot up several notches until it was practically tangible.

“No, that’s not the end of this, Eret! You don’t get to cop out with that! We’ve got a fuck ton of Brits here, how are you the only one to recognize this one specific diamond?”

“Diamonds that big are rare! There’s only like ten of them of that size or bigger in the entire world! And it’s historically important!”

“Obviously not enough for the rest of the people here to know it!”

Techno jumped in, following his brother’s lead. “You’ve also kept accusing Tommy! Who, may I remind you, is literally _sixteen_ and also sick!”

“He was the only one of us who didn’t have an alibi when Bad died! It was the only logical conclusion!”

“No, it wasn’t, because, once again, he is a _child_!”

“And he left our group when Karl died.” Dream tacked on.

“I was in the bathroom!”

Dream shrugged. “I’m just saying, man. It’s not looking good for you.”

“But I was with you this entire time today! You saw me!”

“Did I?” Dream raised a hand to his chin, rubbing it consideringly. “Are you sure?”

“Yes!” Eret pleaded desperately. His dark sunglasses still covered his eyes, but he gesticulated wildly, his emotions apparent everywhere else on his body. Niki could only watch as everything fell apart. “Dream, please, tell them!”

“I don’t remember him with us, Dream,” George interjected.

“I was! I promise!”

Sapnap hummed. “I don’t remember either. My memory’s a little bit foggy.” There was a sick gleam in his eyes, but it was too late to stop the storm their words had prompted.

“You see?” Wilbur proclaimed, arms spread wide like a preacher fervently guiding the masses. And with that same religious passion, he turned the witch hunt onto Niki’s friend. “He shifts the blame onto the innocent, he’s gone when he shouldn’t be, he has _no_ alibi, and he knows things he shouldn’t! Is there any more evidence we all need that this man is responsible?”

“Nobody from his group has died,” Tommy said in a small voice. His shoulders curled inwards, and he shifted away from Tubbo slightly. “They’re all fine, and everybody else has lost somebody.”

“I don’t control who lives and dies!” Eret cried uselessly.

“Don’t you?” Dream asked coolly.

Eret turned to Niki and Fundy, stumbling forward on unsteady feet. He ended up on his knees, eye-level with Niki, his sunglasses flying off his face. Even though he winced slightly at the light, he pressed onwards, reaching for them like a lifeline. “Please! Niki, Fundy, Tubbo, you have to believe me! You know me!” He grabbed Niki’s hands. The diamond toppled from her grasp onto the floor. “I’ve worked with you for forever! We’ve _saved_ lives together! You don’t think I’d take them, right?”

Niki couldn’t answer. Her mouth felt like it was sealed shut against her will. She wanted to trust Eret, so badly, _so fucking badly_ , but everything felt like it was lining up against him. Fundy shifted uncomfortably behind her.

Seeing the tears brimming in Eret’s eyes as they stayed quiet almost broke Niki. It physically hurt her to prevent herself from reaching out, but the nagging doubt in her mind kept growing louder. It wouldn’t shut up, asking her _what if_ and _who knows_ and _what will you do_ and she didn’t want to think about any of it! She just wanted to have a fun time with her friends, was that too much to ask?

“We’re sorry, Eret,” Fundy whispered, feather-soft. “But it feels like it’s all against you.”

From the corner of her eye, Niki watched Tubbo shuffle closer to Tommy, reaching out for comfort. Unlike the man in front of her, Tubbo actually received the reassurance he needed.

But Eret was left out in the cold.

“Problem solved, boys!” Wilbur announced. “We’ve caught ourselves a murderer! Now, what should we do with him?”

Eret stopped responding to the vitriol launched against him. He curled into himself, tears dripping down his chin as he hugged his arms close to his chest.

“I think we should throw him out,” Dream suggested. “Leave him out in the cold with the people he’s killed. Let him think about _that_.”

Techno nodded. “I agree.”

Without any fanfare, Dream and Techno grabbed Eret by the arms and hauled him to his feet. They marched him out of the room and down the hall.

Eret didn’t say a word.

Slowly, oh-so-slowly, Niki got to her feet. Fundy offered her a supporting arm and she took it gratefully. Huddled close together, they trod down the hallway, their feet hitting the floor in time. Tubbo and Tommy followed behind, Wilbur putting a hand on both their shoulders.

Niki could distantly see the group further ahead of them. Their situation almost reminded her of the marches they’d had for the funerals outside. Only, this time, the accompaniment was less an honor guard and more a threatening escort. There was no respect to be found in this parade. Just anger and betrayal and grim satisfaction. She hated it. She wanted to see Eret speak up again, say something, anything! But he was silent and broken down. His tall figure looked much smaller from the combined effect of being surrounded by equally tall people and the defeat that weighed on his shoulders.

They reached a door; Niki had lost track of which one was the entry point for who.

Dream turned his head over his shoulder, never once loosening his white-knuckled grip on Eret. “George, Sapnap, get the other doors. Make sure they’re locked. Check the windows, too.”

His friends – _henchmen, more like_ – scurried off to complete their tasks. Niki felt sick.

Dream swung the door open like he was announcing a grand entrance. But this exit was anything but grand. “Any last words, you _murderer_?” When Eret didn’t respond, he shook his arm. “ _Speak up._ ”

“I’m innocent,” Eret repeated, though he didn’t look at anybody.

The freezing wind whistled through the room, biting at Niki’s nose and whipping her hair around her face. If it was this cold just standing in the doorway, the outside must be terrible. And Eret didn’t have any of his winter gear.

 _He’s going to die out there,_ Niki realized.

She tried to speak up, to raise her voice in defense of her betrayed friend, but it was too late. With one final shove, Dream and Techno forced Eret out the door before unceremoniously slamming it shut in front of his face.

There was silence for a few moments, with a burning sense of finality accompanying it, before a single small knock rung through the room like a gunshot to the chest.

“Maybe we should-” Niki started, but Dream shushed her.

“He killed them; this is what he gets.”

That single small knock remained the only sound they heard for ages, Wilbur taking Tommy and Tubbo out of the room and hopefully to someplace warm, when the knocking started up again. Rather than the one tiny sound, though, it was loud, frantic. Banging on the door, faintly muffled pleas for help, before those too died off. Niki curled into Fundy and sobbed.

George and Sapnap returned, clearly successful. They made no acknowledgment of Niki and Fundy’s delicate emotional states – _maybe they don’t know what to say? We were friends with a_ murderer _, apparently_ – as they moved to Dream’s side.

“I want to go home, Fundy,” Niki whispered shakily.

“Me too, Niki,” he responded, trembling hand rubbing circles on her back, “me too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It was never meant to be.
> 
> Also, should I make a discord for this? Would that be something you all are interested in? Communal sleuthing, chilling together, etcetera?


	8. One mattress, laid lengthwise

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Moon has become the thematic card for this fic.

Fundy was a coder at heart. Even though he’d left the field as only a hobby to pursue his fantasies of heroism and epic rescues, code shaped his worldview. He liked the feeling of logic that came with it: if x input occurs, then x output results. The control, too. With code, Fundy could control everything with the power of his knowledge and a shit ton of trial and error.

This situation he was in was the exact opposite of that logical, controlled environment he preferred.

Tightly wound chaos would be how he’d describe it.

Everything, and he meant _everything_ , was balanced on a knife’s edge. Any little word out of place from him, any moment where he was unaccounted for, and he could be dead or believed a killer. At this point, it was a toss-up about which he’d actually face.

Really, though. His life was in peril. Two bodies were buried outside, another two still laid in the house, and Fundy had just watched one of his coworkers, a man he’d looked up to, get thrown out under suspicion of murder.

The mansion was filled to the brim with tension. Dream and his cronies were radiating an air of smugness, like they were glad they’d thrown Fundy’s friend outside to face his icy death. Sure, they probably thought they were the heroes, saving everybody from the evil Eret, but Fundy couldn’t see that at all.

All he could see was the resigned slump of Eret’s shoulders as his attempts to defend himself were shut down. All he could see was the snow already dusting Eret’s shirt in the doorway. All he could see was the jacket left abandoned and unused by Eret’s sleeping bag.

All he could see were the tears dripping down his friend’s face when Fundy spoke those final damning words against him.

And all he could hear was the loud silence following the sudden end of Eret’s knocks against the door.

Fundy wasn’t sure about anything anymore. This wasn’t a situation where he could alter a variable and run the program again, seeing what changed and what was screwing with his code. This was all too real, something that he couldn’t try again. He couldn’t isolate if Eret was the murderer anymore. If anything, he felt like his hands were the bloody ones now.

Did he lead the charge against Eret? No.

But his lack of support had been the final nail in Eret’s wintry coffin.

Still, the evidence and the accusations circled his mind, a constant loop of angry voices and pointed fingers.

Eret knew about the diamond – _but he was studying International Relations, he had a reason to know._

He would have knowledge of local plants – _but so did Fundy, and Niki, and Tubbo, and they all used it for good._

He kept accusing Tommy – _but he was suspicious, and Eret had always been one to stick with his gut feeling._

He left before Karl died – _but was that confirmation of guilt?_

He hadn’t been with Dream the whole time either – _but had he? He directly contradicted Dream’s assertion there, and George and Sapnap had been awfully quick to jump onto that. Had he been framed by Dream?_

Fundy wasn’t confident in the decision to exile Eret anymore.

With Niki huddled into his side, he unzipped his parka and shifted to take it off. Fundy wrapped Niki up in it. Even though she had a thick coat of her own, one that probably fit her better, he figured she’d like the comfort it offered.

Still, they weren’t the only ones mourning.

Tubbo was in the same boat as them, though the poor kid looked like he was in shock. He drifted between Tommy and the rest of the Ski Patrol in a quiet stupor.

Tommy, Wilbur, and Technoblade were all reeling from the sudden loss of their brother. Though the older two both seemed slightly more appeased by bringing the apparent culprit to justice, Tommy was more focused on his missing family. Plus, his greater attunement to Tubbo meant that he at least was empathetic towards Tubbo’s emotional state. If he was happy about Eret’s treatment, Tommy hid it better than his brothers.

Dream, George, and Sapnap at least had had the closure of burying Karl already. However, Skeppy and Phil’s bodies were still inside the mansion. With the rapidly approaching darkness and the presence of Eret outside, Fundy doubted that they’d be buried like Bad and Karl had been.

He stood and gathered his fellow patrollers. “Guys, let’s…let’s go find somewhere to put Skeppy and Phil to rest.” He tried to sound optimistic. “We get to go exploring some more!”

It still fell flat. He really wasn’t emotionally stable enough for this. But for the sake of his patrol mates – _all of whom were younger than him, fuck, he was the oldest now_ – he had to at least try.

Like he was shepherding sheep, he herded Niki and Tubbo away from the two smaller groups. Dream, George, and Sapnap pacing by the door they’d thrown Eret out of. Wilbur, Techno, and Tommy sitting together, whispering in hushed tones.

Back down the hall they went, sweeping through the common room and down another hallway, this one leading back towards the kitchen. Fundy watches Niki’s wary eyes flick past each door they left behind. Paranoid. Understandable, he supposed. He was in the same boat as her, to be honest. Who knew if there was somebody lurking behind a corner, just waiting to pop out and snap a neck, or slit a throat, or do who knows what next. Every death had been different, Fundy was well aware. He shuddered to think of what might happen next, especially if the group had been wrong and Eret really had been innocent.

All his thoughts were circling back to Eret now. The guilt really was eating away at him. _If only he’d stood up for him, if only he’d advocated for time and reason, if only he’d stopped Dream, if only he’d opened that door, if only, if only, if only._

There were a lot of things Fundy wished were different.

But as Tubbo pointed to a doorway hidden in a corner down the hall from the kitchen, he decided to leave the wishes for later and focus on the tasks he needed to complete now.

The little room they emerged into was surprisingly pretty and nice, for all the oppressive atmosphere of the rest of the mansion. A small sunroom, it was paneled in glass along three of the four walls, letting in the fading rays of dim sunlight. There were a few wilting plants in cracked ceramic pots littering the corners of the room, not to mention the thick layer of dust coating everything, but Fundy felt…better, in here, for lack of a better word.

Piled against the window, he could see that the snow was several feet thick, which didn’t bode well for their ability to leave any time soon. He sighed.

At least Tubbo seemed happier here. Niki, too. With the actual windows here, in a place not scarred by the death of someone they’d gotten to know, it was like a weight lifted from everybody’s shoulders. The thick grey clouds parted for a moment, allowing a stronger shaft of sunlight to shine in. All three Ski Patrol members stared at each other at the same time before slowly turning their gazes towards the sunny spot on the floor.

They raced towards it, dogpiling on top of each other in the small ray of sunlight. Fundy ended up on the bottom of the pile, covered in his smiling friends. For just this short little moment, this felt normal. It felt like their times curled up together at the Ski Patrol base, steaming mugs of cocoa warming winter-chilled hands and reddened noses. It felt like a time when Fundy didn’t have to look over his shoulder for a potential murderer, like a time when he could be young and dumb and goofy and didn’t have to think about the consequences.

But then Fundy turned his head back towards the window, back towards that massive pile of snow with more coming down from the sky by the second. The clouds moved, covering the sun once again and dimming the room back to grey.

Was – was Eret okay out there?

_Who was he kidding, of course he wasn’t okay. Temperatures below freezing, no clothing to provide heat insulation, and snow plummeting from the sky to increase the issue more._

As a member of Ski Patrol, Fundy was well aware of the ins and outs of frostbite. In conditions like this, with freezing temperatures and cold wind, Eret would have had less than half an hour before frostbite started to set in. If he wasn’t dead yet from the cold, he most certainly would be facing irreversible damage.

Fundy pictured one poor snowboarder he’d once rescued from a collision with a tree. The man’s nose had been blistered and red from the cold. And that was just milder degrees.

If Eret lived, he would almost definitely lose limbs.

Like the sun outside, Fundy’s good mood disappeared behind stormy clouds of doubt and guilt.

Noticing this, Niki prodded him in the arm. The atmosphere in the sunroom shifted to something more somber. “I – do you think this would be a good place to leave Phil and Skeppy? Only, it’s so isolated but they’ll still get sunshine and not be stuck in the dark in there and we probably wouldn’t come out here much and-”

Fundy cut her off before her rambling got the best of her. “It feels right.”

Tubbo nodded in agreement.

Slowly they untangled themselves from their pile, dusting off hardened bits of dirt and setting off back to the main group.

It was quiet when they returned. The groups were still isolated, sequestered and set apart from each other. Fundy mourned internally for the easy dialogue they’d had when this first started, before anybody died, back when they all thought they’d be stuck here for a few days then leave and get on with their lives. Now, no matter what, each and every person would be leaving this mansion irrevocably changed.

“Um…” Tubbo trailed off. He looked to Fundy for help.

The ginger stepped forward. “We think we found a place to let Phil and Skeppy – well, um. Yeah. Do you guys think now is a good time to…?”

Wilbur pushed himself to his feet. With a quick glance of confirmation to Techno, he nodded. “It wasn’t feeling right just leaving Phil out here. Thanks for…stepping up, I guess.”

Fundy didn’t know how to respond, so he turned to Dream instead.

The blond in question quickly voiced his assent. “We weren’t as close with Skeppy, but he still deserves better than to be left out like this.”

Once again, the groups split off, the brothers to retrieve Phil, the friends to collect Skeppy. The patrollers followed the small family to the common room, ready to grab people’s belongings and move them out.

When they arrived, he watched Tubbo move over to grab Tommy’s hand, offering his friend silent support. Fundy was glad they had each other in here. The boys were a source of stability for each other. They deserved any speck of good they could get in this horrific situation.

From the corner of his eye, he spotted Niki grab a few of the white sheets used to cover the towers of stuff around the room. She shook them out a few times, sneezing at the dust that filled the air, but folded them up with care and bundled them beneath her arm.

Right. Sheets. Those would probably be helpful.

Wilbur and Technoblade grasped Phil at the head and feet, respectively. Together, they lifted their brother from the spot on the floor where he’d died and followed behind Fundy as he led them out, Niki at his side. He wasn’t sorry to be leaving that room behind. It felt like every place where somebody had died was tainted. He didn’t want to be there any longer than he had to. Fundy had never been a superstitious person, but there was an element of _wrongness_ that permeated the sites of the murders. He shuddered.

Down the hall they went, Dream and Sapnap carrying Skeppy catching up and falling in line behind them at one point. George dogged at their heels. It seemed like he’d had the same thought as Niki, because he was carrying a ball of sheets as well, most likely stripped from the bed in the room where Skeppy had been.

Yet another funeral march proceeded deeper into the mansion, turning twisting corners and passing by the kitchen, until they reached the inconspicuous door to the sunroom. Fundy twisted the handle open again, holding it open so that everybody else could go in first. He scanned the room outside before shutting the door behind him as he entered the sunroom.

The ginger caught a few enthralled eyes gazing around the surprisingly airy room. Some of its magic was gone to Fundy now, but he didn’t begrudge them their appreciation. Who knew when they’d next find a room as open and light as this one.

For now, the two pairs carrying bodies laid them down side by side, heads close to the glass and feet reaching towards the doorway out. George handed Sapnap a rumpled sheet, and Niki did the same for Wilbur. In unison, they unfurled the sheets, letting gravity pull them down over the faces of their now-gone friends. Fundy wrapped an arm around Tubbo’s shoulder, pulling the teen – and by extension, Tommy – to his side to offer whatever modicum of comfort he could.

No words were said this time. Everybody was out of words to say. With death after death, it was getting so hard to summon up the motivation to say something poetic and final.

Skeppy didn’t have anybody he was close with anymore to give him a proper eulogy. Where he’d said such kind and emotional words about Bad, he received silence instead.

Phil’s brothers seemed too shaken to give any speeches. Techno hardly seemed like he was one for flowery words and displays of emotion in the first place, Wilbur was appeased somewhat by retaliating against Eret, and Tommy was too overwhelmed and young to take on the burden of saying those parting words.

So instead, all nine of them stood in silence and communal grief, letting their actions and the sheet-covered bodies speak for themselves.

Fundy hated to be the bearer of bad news, especially in a delicate situation like this, but all he could think about was the honor that these two men were receiving while his own friend was left out to rot, the others practically spitting on his grave for good measure. His stomach was churning and his throat was raspy as he broke the silence. “Hey, guys, um. What if – what if it wasn’t Eret?”

Dream swirled to face him. “What do you mean, what if? It _was_ him. We caught him. We’re safe!”

“Did we, though?”

“What are you saying, Fundy?” Wilbur asked. His voice was pleasant, but Fundy still felt like he was toeing a line.

“I – I mean, everything we had against him was circumstantial. A-and I’m not saying that as, like, an accusation or anything. But…I’ve been wondering.”

“He was the only one that everything was stacked against, though.”

“But I knew him! We knew him! We,” Fundy gestured to himself, Niki, and Tubbo, “worked with him for ages! We _saved_ lives together! I – I’m having doubts. What if it wasn’t Eret? What if we threw an innocent man out into the cold to _die_? Doesn’t that make us no better than whoever is killing our friends?”

Dream’s eyes narrowed. “Are you comparing us to that _murderer_?”

“No, no, no!” Fundy backtracked. “But what if it wasn’t him?”

“But it was.”

“Just consider it, man! What would you do if another person died, and it turns out Eret didn’t do it, and there’s still a murderer here?”

Scoffing, Dream replied, “I’d do to them what they did to all those people who died.”

Alright, that was a little bit intimidating. Fundy backed off, lowering his head. “Right.”

“I know you’re feeling sad because you just realized that someone you were close with was far different from what you thought they were.” Wilbur patted his shoulder. “But it isn’t healthy to dwell on it. You have teammates to think about. Take care of them, okay?”

“Okay,” Fundy nodded.

He watched everybody else file out in front of him. Niki stayed back, wrapping her hand into the hem of his shirt. She looked up at him with concern in her eyes. “Are you doing okay?”

“Yeah, just,” Fundy waved vaguely in the air around him, “all of this.”

Niki seemed to understand. “Yeah, I get it. I never thought this would happen to me.” She laughed bitterly. “This is the kind of thing you read about in horror stories, not real life.”

“Yeah.”

“Yeah.”

“Man, we really are wordy today, aren’t we?”

Niki giggled slightly, before leaning towards the ginger. Her blonde hair slid forwards over her shoulder as she eyed the exit furtively, as if checking to see if anybody was coming back. “Listen, there’s this room. Bad, Phil, George, and I all found it together on the first morning. Which was actually yesterday, now that I think about it. And it gave me really bad vibes. Like, it felt really off. Would you – would you mind checking it out with me again?”

“Now?”

“When else?”

Fundy’s gut told him that something was off, but it was the kind of inkling that he needed to check it out, not leave it alone. He shrugged. “Why not, I guess. I – I’m not sure if I want to be around the rest of them right now, to be honest.”

With one last glance over his shoulder at the white mounds on the floor, the last bits of sunlight of the day casting deep shadows into the dips and trenches from the bodies, Fundy closed the door to the sunroom with a sense of finality before following Niki back in the direction of the common room.

Niki kept scanning the doors on the left side of the hallway. She was looking for something specific, though what, Fundy wasn’t sure. Finally, as they came upon a door a little ways past the kitchen, one separated from its hinges with a large crack through the upper right corner, she rushed over. Fundy quickly followed, curious about this room she’d been leading him towards.

She stopped, though, before opening it. Running a hand over the crack, Fundy heard her mutter, “This wasn’t there before.”

A pit settled into his stomach. By the look on Niki’s face, her skin paling further by the second, she felt the same sudden anxiety that he did. Locking eyes, they silently counted down.

_Three._

_Two._

_One._

Niki shoved the door out from where it was wedged into its frame. Before it hit the ground on the other side, she shot out a hand to grab the edge, holding it up and maneuvering it to the side.

There, sitting inside a dingy little room, one little lightbulb hanging uselessly from the ceiling, lay a body. With hands and face blackened and skin paper-white, it was almost unrecognizable. Honestly, it was one of the worst cases of frostbite Fundy had ever seen in his career. But the frozen-stiff grey shirt and frost-covered black sunglasses were a clear indication of this person’s identity, even if Fundy hadn’t had his suspicions immediately.

Niki’s hands flew up to her mouth in a silent exclamation.

Fundy’s knees went weak.

Even without the frostbite factored in, the bloody, caved-in skull ensured that Eret, poor Eret, who wasn’t even supposed to be inside anymore, was dead.


	9. Alpheratz

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> datofestet omhylla whister

With horror filling every inch of her body, Niki slowly sank to the floor. Her friend, her dear friend, was sprawled bonelessly across a dingy mattress in the dank room.

His head was _fucking_ caved in like someone had taken a sledgehammer and bashed him across the face with it. They’d sent him outside to die, accused him of a fucking _murder_ – no, _multiple_ murders – and yet his body, lying there, was proof enough that he was innocent.

They’d left an innocent man to die a slow, painful death.

Niki’s emotions were quickly picking up speed and swirling and morphing like her own internal blizzard. She felt full of ice rage and grief and loathing for herself for letting her friend, someone she trusted, get thrown out like he was trash. _How could she have just stood by and let that happen? Isn’t she better than this? Isn’t she supposed to save people? Had a few days in this mansion really twisted her morals that much?_

Fundy, his own face pale next to her, leaned down to check on her. She waved him off, levering herself back to her feet. “I’m fine.”

“You don’t look it.”

“Neither do you.”

“Fair.”

She clenched her fists by her sides. “I cannot – I cannot _believe_ this! We let this happen, Fundy! We let them throw him to the _dogs_!”

“I know.”

“And we – _urgh_!”

“I know.”

Hardening her resolve, Niki promptly about-faced and marched out of the room. Fundy scrambled to follow her. “Niki, wait, where are you going?”

“I’m going to give those – those _monsters_ a piece of my mind!”

“You can’t mean that!” Fundy sprinted to block her path. “Niki, I’m upset too, but we can’t alienate ourselves from the group like that! Everybody’s at each other’s throats! Do you want to be thrown out like Eret was?”

“I’d rather be thrown out like Eret was with a clean conscience than sit back and let more innocent people die when I could have prevented it!”

“Niki, please-”

“Fundy, _move_.”

When confronted with Niki’s steely glare, Fundy quickly relented. He still dogged at her heels, but he didn’t try to stop her anymore. She stormed onwards, speeding down the hallway and back to the common room.

The anger felt like a physical beast inside of her, pushing Niki to a level of righteous fury she’d never felt before. Defending Eret from homophobes? She could do that, no problem, and had done it before with a steady hand and cool head. But apparently she’d failed at defending him from a serial killer. So all that was left for her to do now was defend his memory and save the rest of this sorry crew from the murderer amongst them. She was angrier than she’d ever been, her nails digging crescents into her palms and her teeth clenched so hard that distantly, she worried that she’d crack them.

When the duo finally reached the central gathering room, where the youngest were huddled by the roaring fireplace while the rest of the group lounged casually on the couches. George even looked like he was moments from passing out. That changed, though, as Niki’s blood turned icy-cold again and she slammed one clenched fist into the side of a tower. It wobbled dangerously and the group collectively jumped, but Niki was past caring about that.

Wilbur was the first to pick up on her unusual emotional state. “Niki, hey, what’s wrong?” he asked gently, like he was calming a feral animal. Who knew, maybe he was, with how Niki was feeling.

“What’s wrong? _What’s wrong?_ What’s wrong is that Eret, my _friend_ , is dead!”

“Niki, we know that. It was kind of the point of throwing him out,” Dream tried to console.

“No, no, I don’t think you’re seeing the point here! He isn’t out dead somewhere under the snow for you all to wash your hands of! No, he’s in this house, with his skull caved in and practically missing his limbs from frostbite! And do you know what that means?” She swiveled her head from side to side, glaring daggers into everybody who’d been complicit in the death of her friend. “Well? Do you?”

Nobody dared to answer her.

“It _means_ that Eret was innocent! That it wasn’t him! He couldn’t exactly crack his own head open and drag himself inside this house when you all locked him out, could he? No, he couldn’t! So that means that you all condemned an innocent man to _die_!”

The realization slowly dawned upon the faces of everybody else, horror matching Niki’s own even being painted across a few faces. Tommy and Tubbo clutched each other closer, George looked green, Wilbur’s shock was plain to see.

But looking at Dream’s blank expression had Niki seeing red. The bastard, the man who hadn’t batted an eyelash at leading the witch trial against Eret, the man who still seemed unbothered by learning that he’d essentially killed someone. She strode right up to him and pointed her finger in his face. “Don’t think I don’t see you, you coldhearted, remorseless monster! I can’t – I can’t believe you! You just stand here like nothing’s wrong when I’ve just told you that it’s your fault that my friend is dead! What is _wrong_ with you?”

“Niki, you’ve got to understand, we all thought it was him! We thought-”

“No, _you_ thought it was him! And you were just so loud that you forced everyone to go along with you!”

“We had to take action!”

“And that course of action was exile and execution!”

“Yes!”

A resounding _slap_ rang across the room.

Dream clutched his jaw.

Niki shook out her hand.

“I – I’m _done_ with you. With all of you!”

Letting the silence reign behind her, Niki left as abruptly and angrily as she’d first entered.

The stars peeked through the finally clear sky. Niki liked it up here. It was quieter, more peaceful. And devoid of other people.

Or at least it was, until Wilbur clambered onto the roof behind her. He sounded like he was trying to be stealthy, but his shoes slipped around and gave him away.

“You know, this is one of the reasons I became a member of the Ski Patrol,” Niki commented, not looking at Wilbur. “Saving lives is satisfying, and I feel like I’m doing something impactful. But seeing this sort of view? If I hadn’t moved to such a remote area, I never would have seen this. I never would’ve known that it was even possible for the sky to look like this.”

It was brighter than the normal assumption of nighttime. Thanks to the complete lack of light pollution, every single star was visible to Niki’s eyes. Navy blue and speckled with pinpricks of white, Niki could even see the nebulous shape of a galaxy cutting across the center of her field of view. It was gorgeous. With the black outlines of tall evergreens providing a frame, Niki wanted to just take this image and save it forever.

“Eret was the one who taught me to identify the constellations.”

As Wilbur sat down next to her, she gently grabbed his hand and started pointing around the sky. “Right there is the North Star, and then there’s the handle of the Little Dipper. You can see the Big Dipper to the left of it. If you look to the right, you can see Cassiopeia. Below it is Andromeda and Perseus.”

“You sure know a lot about stars.”

“I like them,” Niki mused. “They’re a constant. No matter how much of my life changes, the stars stay the same.”

“That’s quite poetic of you.”

Niki giggled half-heartedly.

Sighing, Wilbur leaned back onto the roof, just staring up at the sky. Niki joined him.

“You know,” he commented, “up here, it feels like all this is just for us.”

“Everybody can see the stars, Wil.”

“No, no, I know that.” He sat upright, bits of snow drifting down from his back. “But, like, up here, it doesn’t feel like they exist. It’s so quiet. If I close my eyes, it almost feels like everything has stopped. And when I look up, it feels like I can just kind of grab the sky with my hands and just keep it. It’d just be for us!”

“I like that, Wil. You’re a poet in your own right, too.”

“Why, thank you Niki, you’re too kind.”

Together, the two talked the night away, backs against the roof and eyes pointed towards the heavens.

Though Niki had barely slept a wink the night previous, she was fueled by a sense of vigor and purpose through the morning. She’d gotten to vent, to some degree, and her musings to Wilbur and the stars had helped clear her mind.

Today, she needed to show the rest of their little ‘group’ Eret’s body, if Fundy hadn’t already. They needed to see the consequences of their reckless and irresponsible actions. And then they needed to give Eret the respect in death that he deserved.

Niki drew in a deep breath, letting it inflate her lungs and puff up her chest. Slowly, she released it, sinking back down and bolstering herself to start her tasks.

Today was not going to be an easy day.

When Niki arrived back in the common room, a hush fell over the people gathered there. Everyone was munching on assorted granola bars taken from backpacks and bags, but even the chewing lowered in volume. Sheepish, Niki waved and sat over by Tubbo, who passed her a snack as well.

As if the crackle of the wrapper opening was a signal, smaller group conversations reignited. From the corner of her eye, Niki could see George having a hushed argument with Sapnap, while Dream appeared to be trying to explain something to Technoblade, his hands expressing almost half his words for him

Tommy, Tubbo, and Fundy gathered around Niki, sitting quietly and eating their meager breakfast. Wilbur, when he walked in behind her, joined them, receiving his own granola bar and happily breaking it open.

“So.”

Niki’s weak attempt at starting a conversation went over about as well as she’d expected it to. That is to say, not well at all. Tubbo’s mouth flew shut from where he’d been opening it to take his next bite. Tommy set his breakfast down and looked ready to run away at any moment. _Did she really scare them that much last night?_

As if reading her thoughts, Tubbo swallowed. “Sorry, Niki, it’s just – well, I’ve never seen you that angry before. It was scary!”

“It was not!” Tommy protested.

“You were so scared, Tommy.”

“Absolutely not! I am massive! I’m certainly not scared of such a small person as Niki!”

Raising an eyebrow, Niki leaned forwards. “Boo.”

Tommy yelped, then flushed bright red. Tubbo laughed, Wilbur and Fundy joining in. “What was that you were saying, Tommy?” Niki smiled sweetly.

“I take it back! I take it back! You are very scary and intimidating and I’m deeply sorry please don’t do that again!”

“Don’t make me mad and you won’t have to worry about it.” Niki patted Tommy’s knee and stood up again.

“Yes ma’am,” he saluted.

“Orders today, Miss Niki, sir!” Wilbur jumped to his feet, stood at attention.

Fundy joined in. “We await your command!”

Laughing heartily, the teens raised sloppy hands to their foreheads, though their mirth was too great to stand in the rock-solid stance Wilbur was pulling off.

Niki hated to break their rare lighthearted mood. Playing along, she pulled her hands behind her back and marched back and forth in front of their vague line. “Tommy! Tubbo!”

The boys jumped at their names. “I need you two to check the kitchens! We’re all going to be hungry soon enough, especially with only granola bars. Find me food, and you’ll get a proper meal for lunch!”

Cheering, the teens ran off to complete their task.

“Wilbur! Go after them. I don’t trust the chaos that those two can get up to on their own. Adult supervision is your job!”

“Yes, ma’am!” Wilbur snapped off a clean salute and jogged off in the direction of the boys.

“Fundy.” Here, Niki’s voice dropped back to a truly serious tone. Sensing the change, Fundy let his hand drop from his forehead. “We need to give Eret a proper rest. And part of that means showing them,” she waved at the four other stranded men, “the consequences of their actions. They’re going to help us.”

“Are – are you sure?”

Niki nodded sharply. “I’m certain.” She turned to gather their attention. “Hey, boys!”

Their heads snapped up. “Come with us.”

Leading a trail of slightly uncomfortable men behind her, Niki turned and stopped in front of the doorway to that tiny little room. She held her arm out in front of her in offering. “Well? Are you going in?”

George stepped in first, though he quickly turned away and held his hand up to his mouth. She didn’t quite blame him for his reaction – frostbite was a gruesome sight – but she couldn’t help the small curl of satisfaction in her gut at seeing one of Eret’s persecutors so affected. This was what came of his actions. _Let him feel that guilt._

Technoblade followed, his face remaining much more neutral. The most change in expression Niki could spot was a mild furrow in his brow.

Dream and Sapnap didn’t even enter.

Deciding to ignore this, Niki strode inside. “Techno, would you mind helping me move him.?”

He raised an eyebrow. “Are you sure you don’t want me to take him myself?”

“I’m stronger than I look, Technoblade.”

Shrugging, the pink-haired man acquiesced. Techno grabbed Eret’s shoulders, Niki took his thighs. She was half worried that if she put weight any lower down his limbs, they’d crumble beneath her fingers. Logically, her mind knew that wouldn’t happen, that wasn’t how frostbite worked, but she decided to cave to the emotional side of herself on this. They maneuvered out of the room somewhat awkwardly, but without any other issues.

Fundy took point this time, escorting Niki and Techno with their precious cargo to the sunroom further down the wing of the house. Dream, Sapnap, and George trailed behind them, unsure of their place here.

Niki made no move to reassure them or make them feel better. _So she’s feeling spiteful, sue her._

As they turned past the kitchen, a sneaky glance revealed that Tubbo had spotted them. _He’s never seen frostbite like this before. Poor kid._

She wanted to shield him from this, really, she did, but Niki also knew that Tubbo had as much of a right as any other person – if not more than most of those in this mansion – to be a part of this final goodbye to Eret.

Pale, bloodless, Tubbo jogged up to Fundy’s side and took his hand, looking for all the world like a lost child. Her heart ached, but Niki kept her head up high and marched onwards. With Wilbur and Tommy noticing Tubbo’s absence, the brothers quickly joined the procession on their way back to the sunroom.

Fundy opened the small door with a loud _creak_.

Just like they’d left it. Dim grey sunlight, a pair of sheet-covered bodies, browned and crumbling plants.

This room could have been beautiful in its heyday. Now, it was a modified burial ground.

Slowly, gently, Niki and Techno carried Eret’s body over to the window, laying him down next to Phil. Stiff with ice and rigor mortis, Eret wasn’t laying as peacefully as Skeppy or Phil were, especially with the thickly coagulated blood coating his face and his clearly misshapen skull, but they made it work.

It had to work.

Tubbo tapped Niki’s arm. “Can – can I do the sheet?” he asked smally.

 _Oh, Tubbo._ Her heart shattering again, Niki grabbed one of the sheets they’d laid out and handed it to Tubbo. “Of course you can.”

Her friend, practically her little brother, tiptoed over to where they’d laid Eret down and carefully unfolded the pristine white sheet. He flapped it once, twice, before letting gravity pull it down over Eret’s body.

Where it made contact with Eret’s head, Niki could see the sheet turn red with blood. Not quite soaked, but the thin layer did nothing to disguise the gory mess that remained of Eret’s face.

Niki turned to face the guilt-ridden audience. “Now do you see what you’ve caused? What happens when you let suspicion and paranoia take over _basic human decency_? You get this. You get innocent people left for dead.”

She made deliberate and meaningful eye contact with each person. “I hope you’re happy.”

Just like she had the night before, Niki swept out of the room before anyone else and left them to their thoughts.

When Niki was little, her Oma had held her hands and taught her to mix batter, knead dough, and spread icing. Baking had been their thing, how the two of them had bonded. The smell of flour always brought fond memories to Niki’s mind, nostalgia overwhelming her senses and hands moving by rote.

And when Niki’s Oma got sick, baking had been how she got her mind off all her worries. She let her mind go blank and her hands move on her own.

Niki’s Oma hadn’t lasted long, her age combining with illness to take her away, but Niki and her baking had been there every day. She’d been so proud when Oma had complimented her own original recipe. That had been one of the last things she’d ever heard her Oma say.

Now, even though her Oma wasn’t with her anymore, baking was still a form of release for Niki. She got to be productive and create something while also calming herself down.

With the few ingredients that Tubbo, Tommy, and Wilbur had found earlier, Niki found herself whipping together a batch of shortbread cookies. She assembled the sugar, butter, flour, and cornstarch in a row along a counter overlooking a window outside. As she grabbed a few measuring tools from drawers as well, she heard soft footsteps padding in behind her.

“Hey Wil,” she called behind her, cutting up the butter into more manageable chunks. He didn’t respond, but she didn’t need him to. Niki was content to chatter away while she worked and just let Wilbur be her company.

She grabbed a whisk and started beating the butter and sugar together in a bowl. “So, um, sorry for all the yelling yesterday and everything. I just – I was really feeling stressed, you know? What with all the anxiety, and paranoia, and – and death. I was just – so _angry_. They weren’t feeling anything! Don’t they care that they condemned someone to die, much less an innocent one?”

She kept whisking, muscles straining to keep up the quick pace and combine the first two ingredients. “I just don’t know what to do next, Wil. This really is a nightmare, isn’t it?”

She heard a low hum of assent from behind her.

“Yeah, it’s just – I can’t _believe_ them. And I hate that I’m so caught up in this! Baking is supposed to be my stress reliever, not make me feel more of it!”

With a cupful of dry ingredients, Niki slowly moved to the next step. She bounced back and forth between adding the cornstarch and flour and incorporating them into her dough. “And I’m really worried about Tubbo. Tommy, too, but you’d know better about him than I do. But Tubbo, well, he’s like a brother to me at this point. And he’s so _young_! He’s only sixteen, and he’s stepping up with all this responsibility! Don’t get me wrong, I’m proud of him! But now he’s here, dealing with all this death, and that worries me. He’s so bright and optimistic! He should be worrying about – about, like, _girls_ , or his next test, or whatever! Not about which person he knows is going to die next.”

She started splitting up the completed dough, rolling it into small balls beneath her hands. The muscle memory came back smoothly, as she placed perfectly portioned cookies onto her baking sheet. “I really hope this all turns out for the better, Wil, really, I do. I don’t want anybody else to die. We’ve all dealt with enough death for a lifetime in the past few days here, I think.”

With a baking sheet in each hand, Niki moved over to the little wood-fire oven, a small flame already flickering merrily inside. “Hey, Wil, do you mind-”

He reached around her to open the door for her. “Thanks, Wil.” Dusting off her hands and shutting the door, Niki finally turned to face her friend.

“Wait – you-”

After Niki had stormed out of the room again, Wilbur had taken it upon himself to lead everybody back to the common room again. He figured it was about time to give her some space to destress away from everybody who’d made her mad – himself included, he was sure. She needed to work through her grief and anger and anxiety.

He tried to occupy his time by distracting Tommy and Tubbo, trying to get their minds off all the death, but his transparent efforts weren’t working. They sat quietly by the fire, not talking or doing much of anything.

Wilbur sighed. He wished he were anywhere but here. The guilt was eating him alive. Had that really been him who had been so proud to send someone outside to face the cold? Admittedly, he had thought Eret was a murderer who’d killed his older brother. The evidence had all lined up against him! How could it not have been Eret!

And yet Eret’s cold body laying in the sunroom was a damning point towards his innocence.

Now all Wilbur’s rage-fueled pride was gone, replaced with a deep pit in his stomach and a gnawing feeling at his heart. He could hardly believe himself. _Fuck, he’s an idiot._

“Guys we – we really fucked up.”

Techno snorted sardonically. “Tell us something we don’t know, Wil.”

“What happened to us all?”

“We got caught up in the thrill of revenge is what happened,” Dream said.

“So that justifies what we did?”

“It explains it at least.”

“That doesn’t make it okay!”

“We’re humans, Wilbur! We’re gonna fuck up sometimes!”

“The problem here is that this isn’t just a little mistake! This was us throwing out our fucking humanity in favor of eye-for-an-eye Neolithic vengeance!” He sat back heavily on the couch, rubbing his hands over his eyes. “God, we’re fucking _monsters_.”

“No, we’re not, Wilbur,” Dream argued.

“Then tell me what kind of human throws a guy in nothing more than a t-shirt outside in temperatures below freezing!” Wilbur cried helplessly. “Come on, Dream, enlighten me, please! I’m _dying_ to know here!”

Dream was saved from having to answer that impossible question, his jaw hanging agape, by the faint smell of something burning.

“Wasn’t Niki in the kitchen?” Fundy asked anxiously. Dread already shone starkly on his face.

“Fuck,” Wil cursed. He sprinted away, though he could tell that most of the group wasn’t far behind him. Fear pushed him ever faster, legs pumping as he ran down the straight hallway and to the kitchen.

There wasn’t a fire, thank goodness, but there was a batch of blackened and charred cookies in the little oven. Wilbur raced to grab a towel, opening the oven door, and pulling out the burnt cookies. He dumped the trays onto the countertop, shutting the door behind him with his foot.

“That’s – that’s not like Niki,” Tubbo noted. “She’s a good baker! She wouldn’t just leave and forget about something in the oven.”

“Uh, guys,” George called. “I think I know why she’s gone.”

Wilbur leaned over to George. His heart sank as he saw what George had spotted.

A thin spray of blood dripped onto the kitchen floor, leading away and outside.

Wilbur threw open the door, ignoring the bite of windchill and snow on his skin.

Lucky for them – _but a terrible sign, fuck_ – the red droplets stood out starkly against the white snow. Wilbur plowed through the snow and fog, intent on pursuing the trail. Someone was behind him, he couldn’t tell who, but he ignored them and trudged onwards. His jeans were soaked through, his fingers already numb, but that didn’t matter.

Just as he was beginning to lose hope, just as the trail was getting patchier and fainter, Wilbur reached the edge of the mansion’s clearing.

And there, tied to a thick evergreen with bulky chains, was Niki, her head hanging limply and her shirt stained deep red. Her hair was matted with more blood, blowing in the harsh wind.

“Oh, Niki, _no_ ,” Wilbur whispered, the words stolen away by the wind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's interesting to watch you all investigate.  
> However, I'm feeling nice, so here's a hint.
> 
> You're all missing quite a few clues I've left.  
> I might even say half of them.


	10. aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cucG9ldHJ5Zm91bmRhdGlvbi5vcmcvcGxheS83NzA2NQ==

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> b3BndHFqaGllZ2ZwajsnS0RBS0xKQkc=

Sapnap paced back and forth restlessly in the kitchen, practically wearing a line into the hardwood floor. He ran his hands through his hair, over and over. His headband was loosely hanging around his neck, dislodged from his anxious fidgeting.

The smell of burnt cookies filled his nostrils, enough that he could practically taste the ash upon his tongue. He paused in his movement to grab one of the blackened pastries. Holding his hand up to his face, he watched the bits of ash flake from his fingers and descend in fluttering spirals, a stark contrast to the pure white powder that fell from the sky outside in a similar manner.

Poetic, huh.

Sapnap certainly thought so.

Either way, the cookies were ruined. And so was his appetite, as he risked a glance back to the bloody trail George had found. Niki, well, she’d been mad at them. But looking at the evidence laid out before him, a sinking feeling in his stomach, Sapnap thought she might be justified in that anger.

It was looking like she was dead. But if Niki was dead, then that meant that Eret had definitely been innocent. Which meant –

Well, Sapnap didn’t like thinking of what that meant.

“I was _so sure_ that it was Eret,” Dream mused aloud. “I mean, it all worked out against him! The gem, the timing, the plant knowledge, it all pointed to him!”

“But why’d you think that when he was _with us_ when Skeppy died?” George asked.

“Well-”

Sapnap jumped in. “Because we couldn’t have our eyes on him _all_ the time. If everything else stacked against him, who’s to say that he didn’t sneak off while we were distracted or something? Gotten in like the walls and popped over, committed a few crimes, then came back while we were none the wiser?”

“That doesn’t excuse that we basically got an innocent man killed.”

“What were we supposed to do, George!” Dream exploded, his arms flying up aggressively. Sapnap was glad that Techno had taken the teens out and back to the common room for this. They were barely three years younger than him, but they were still kids. The fed-up expression on Dream’s face drew him back to the present moment. “I thought that he was a cold-blooded killer! I _thought_ that maybe, I could do something to help! To protect people! If he had actually been the murderer, then I would’ve saved us! But he wasn’t, and that’s on me, and I fucking _know_ it’s on me! But someone had to take action, and I fucking stepped up! Okay?”

George looked taken aback. He held one hand out in front of him, another bracing himself on the island behind him. Almost ready to defend himself, to run.

Sapnap understood. In all his years of knowing Dream, he’d rarely seen the blond this angry. Dream was generally a mellow guy, laid-back and fun-loving.

This mansion was changing them all for the worse.

“Maybe Niki’s not dead,” Sapnap whispered. “Maybe she just cut herself while cooking, or burned her hand and tried to use the snow to cool it. Maybe she’s fine.”

“Yeah, maybe,” George echoed, though the look on his face showed that he clearly doubted it.

It was a long shot, but Sapnap held some distant hope. Even if the knots in his stomach and the dread in his throat tried to convince him otherwise.

Really, this was all reminding him far too much of Karl’s death.

Karl, who’d done nothing wrong, who’d been such a spark of joy.

His smiles that could light up a whole city, his enthusiasm that encouraged others to feel excited too, his ability to make everyone feel included.

Sapnap could clearly picture the joy on Karl’s face when they told him that he’d be coming on this manhunt with them. His friend had been not-so-subtly hinting about his desire to take part in one for ages beforehand. As the one to give him the news, Sapnap had gotten a massive hug from Karl, and he couldn’t help but jump around with just as much joy as Karl in response. He’d called Jimmy, Chandler, his _mom_ , sharing his excitement with everyone he knew. He’d practically had to hold Karl back from going out and shouting it to the streets.

But all of that was extinguished now, and Sapnap couldn’t get the image of Karl’s limp and bruised body out from behind his eyelids. His sleep ever since then had been uneasy, shallow. When he finally could fully rest, he always woke up and had to re-remember Karl’s death.

It hadn’t been an easy few days for Sapnap.

He was trying to be optimistic, really, he was, but it was hard when at every turn, that positive attitude was crushed by grief and horror.

Case in point, Wilbur marching in through the door carrying Niki’s limp and bloody body past him, Fundy dogging his heels.

Sapnap looked worriedly at Dream and George before hurrying to follow. “Wilbur, hey man, what happened?”

He didn’t answer, just continued resolutely onwards, his face stone-cold. Fundy dropped back a bit to whisper, “He’s been like this since we found her. Way out, chained to a tree. They cut her throat.”

And the parallels between Niki and Karl were back. Fuck.

Following Wilbur, Sapnap quickly realized that they were going back to the sunroom yet again. Goddammit, Niki had only left it a scant few hours earlier after scolding them. Sapnap’s guilt resurfaced.

Wilbur slammed the sunroom’s door open and stomped to the window, where the line of bodies in their snow-white sheets lay peaceful and undisturbed. Niki looked nowhere near as serene. Her face was frozen in an expression of shock and alarm, blood soaked her shirt and hair, and Sapnap didn’t even want to look at her neck.

Anger in every inch of his body, Wilbur threw one of the sheets open and somehow managed to make laying it over Niki’s corpse a fury-filled action. His shoulders shook, his jaw was tight, his hands clenched and unclenched the air by his sides.

Sapnap was honestly kind of scared.

“That is ENOUGH!” he roared, deep voice resonating through the room like an echo through a mountain. He looked about as immovable as one, too. Sapnap doubted that anything would turn him from his rage at this point. “I have had ENOUGH of people FUCKING DYING here! You think NIKI deserved this? NO! She’s – was – the best of us! She was the one to tell us that we FUCKED UP when we tossed Eret out like he was a bag of trash! And she was FUCKING RIGHT! But _apparently_ , she had to DIE to prove it to us!”

Eyes flashing, Wilbur turned to face them. Behind him, Niki’s frozen blood slowly stained the sheet covering her. “She was right all along! She was right.” Slowly, he sank to the floor, the anger draining and leaving only grief.

Fundy leaned over to console him, though Sapnap could see that it was ineffective. The ginger was too wrapped up in his own grief to do a particularly good job. He just kind of rested his head on Wilbur’s shaky shoulder and quivered. There may have been a few attempts at back-patting, but Sapnap doubted that it really had much behind it.

“Wilbur-” George started, but the other Brit held a hand up to stop him.

He took a deep, shuddering breath in, held it for a few moments, then released it just as unsteadily. This repeated, Sapnap rubbing his arm uncomfortably, before Wilbur inhaled again and swooped to his feet. “Right. Okay.”

“You good, man?” Sapnap asked, head tilted.

“No, no, yeah, perfectly fine and dandy over here! Totally! How’re you?”

“Wilbur.” Dream’s voice was perfectly level. “We’ve just lost another person and found out that another person died because of us.”

“I mean, we knew that already, but-”

“Wilbur.”

“I know.” His voice was meek and quiet, and when Wilbur looked up, his face was so miserable and lost that Sapnap just about broke right then and there. “Just, who’s going to tell the kids?”

The common room they came back to was subdued and tense. Where Tubbo had been a pillar of support for Tommy following Phil’s death, the roles were reversed. The taller teen was comforting his friend, holding him close against his side and rubbing circles in his shoulder from where they sat at the fireplace. He was whispering something, but before Sapnap could try to figure out what he was saying, Tubbo heard them enter and looked to them sharply. His eyes brimmed with some emotion that Sapnap couldn’t quite name, but they dulled when Fundy slowly shook his head.

Tubbo buried his head back in Tommy’s side. He was completely still, completely silent, but everybody knew what was happening.

Then, like Wilbur had before him, Tubbo inhaled sharply and raised his head to face them. “So, where is she?”

Tenderly, oh so carefully, Wilbur stepped over to the teens, crouching in front of them and grabbing Tubbo’s hand. “Tubbo – she – she’s gone.”

“I know that, Wilbur. It’s – it’s kind of an unfortunate trend.”

Wilbur huffed out a short snort, dark humor rising to the surface. He turned serious again. “We put her in the sunroom, next to Eret.”

Rather than the saddened response that Sapnap was sure Wilbur was expecting – he certainly was – Tubbo wrenched his hands from Wilbur’s grasp. “You mean you already had the funeral?”

“I – yes.”

“What the hell, man?”

“Tubbo, you – you and Tommy both, really – you’ve seen enough death already. I figured-”

“Yeah, you _figured_!”

“I didn’t want you to have to see this! Not when it’s someone you care about!”

Tubbo stood up, face red, eyes aflame. “Oh, so I didn’t care about Eret? Or Phil? Or Karl or Skeppy or Bad?”

“You _know_ that’s not what I meant-”

“No, fuck you! You can’t keep sheltering us from this forever! You act like we’re dumb! We’re not! We can _see_ what’s happening! And you didn’t even let me have the chance to say _goodbye_?”

Tommy grabbed Tubbo’s shoulder like he was trying to pull him back and deescalate, but Tubbo shrugged him off and ignored it.

“Just because you – you had some sort of _bonding moment_ with her last night, doesn’t mean you have, like, priority with your grief! What about Fundy? Did you let him do anything, after he’s worked with her for years and they bonded over both being foreigners moving to England? What about me? She was like my older sister! She’s the one I looked up to the most! And I won’t even get to say a proper goodbye because you decided to just do whatever you wanted instead!”

“Tubbo, I-”

“Save it, Wilbur. I’m leaving.”

The teen brushed past the taller man, Wilbur’s foot of height on him seeming inconsequential when Tubbo had verbally knocked him to his knees. He strode out of the living room, only stopping at the doorway, one hand grabbing the frame. Tubbo’s head turned, his back still toward the group. “Tommy?”

Startled, Tommy fumbled his way to his feet. He looked almost – surprised, Sapnap would say, at the request for his company.

Reassured that his friend was following him, Tubbo resumed his exit. Tommy turned and looked at Wilbur reluctantly, before following in Tubbo’s wake.

Wilbur looked wrecked. He stood still, silent, shaken. The man hadn’t moved a muscle since Tubbo’s dramatic exit.

Tension filled the room.

Someone coughed.

Uncomfortable with the atmosphere, Sapnap rubbed the back of his head and made the executive decision to change the subject. “So, um. Yeah.”

_Great job._

He could practically hear the cricket noises.

He clapped his hands together once. “Any thoughts? We – um, we know now that Eret wasn’t our killer, so. Who has ideas?”

Fundy shook his head violently. “No, no, nu-uh. Not doing this again. Not after what happened last time. None of this ‘detective’ bullshit.”

“Well, we’ve got to do _something_ ,” Dream rebutted.

“The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results,” Wilbur murmured. He straightened from his thousand-yard stare towards the fireplace, making eye-contact with Dream. “I won’t take part in this again.”

“Fine. Fine!” Dream threw his hands up into the air. “If you just want to sit idly by and wait for your turn to die, that’s your choice. But if anybody actually wants to _take action_ , they can come with me.” He about-faced and swept over to a different door than the one Tommy and Tubbo had left through.

Grunting, Technoblade stood as well and made his way to Dream’s side.

Sapnap looked at George, who stubbornly shied away from his gaze. _Right. That tells me where he’s going._ He trailed Dream, and together, the trio left, letting Dream lead them deeper into the house.

His friend led them with confident strides to a study, one whose contents appeared to have been thrown from the shelves with reckless abandon. Pages littered the floor, maps hung halfway off the walls, and a single unlit candle had been knocked from its wick.

“Alright, ignore the mess,” Dream said, stepping over piles of books. “We, uh, may have gotten overexcited the last time we were here.” He scratched his chin. “Don’t remember it being _this_ messy, though.”

“Well, that’s a great sign for us,” Technoblade commented dryly.

Sapnap snorted. The trio took up various spots around the room. Dream plopped down at the desk, Techno leaned against a bookshelf, and Sapnap just sat criss-cross in the center of the floor. Sue him.

“So, are we all agreed that we need to figure out who’s doing this, and _fast_?” Dream opened their little discussion with all the aplomb of an axe biting into a tree. Confident, steady, meant for this.

After years of knowing Dream, the pair of them having grown up together, Sapnap liked to say he had better insight into Dream than most. Sure, there were moments, quite a few, where his friend was an enigma, but Sapnap was one of the few people who could see past his mask.

Dream, despite all his calm collectedness, was shaken. Sapnap could see it in the lines of his shoulders, in the slight droop of his head, in the nails picked down. He was rattled by the death and the mystery and the _fear_ that drove all of them.

But Dream was a logic-based person, so he was doing his best to make the world make sense. He pushed his emotions to the wayside in favor of _fixing_ what was wrong.

It wasn’t working, but Sapnap understood.

Sapnap, though, was a much more emotional person. He balanced out Dream in that way. When Dream got too cold, Sapnap was there to heat him up with support or his own big displays of emotion. When Sapnap got inflamed, Dream cooled him off with a harsh dose of reality.

But Sapnap was an emotional person, so he couldn’t help himself when he said, “Yep. Absolutely. Let’s start with _him_ ,” and pointed to Technoblade.

The pink-haired man raised a single eyebrow.

_God, he’s infuriating._

“I’m sure I don’t know what you mean.”

“Oh, come on,” Sapnap scoffed. “Remember our little talk the other day? In that living room? Where we were so rudely interrupted by the glass falling? Do I need to jog your memory?”

“Guys,” Dream tried to interject.

“No, no, let’s hear him out. I wanna know what he’s got to say.”

“Alright, _Technoblade_. You’ve been remarkably calm and collected during this whole ordeal.”

“I could say the same for your pal Dream over there.”

“You – you also tried to get us to start investigating Bad’s death right away.”

“That seems like a point against me being the killer, if we’re being honest.”

“You also stayed behind in the room we found him in after we all left!” Sapnap shouted, riled up.

“Maybe that was because I was looking for clues? Something the rest of you all neglected to do, I might add.”

“You – I – come _on_ man, you’ve gotta admit you’ve been acting sus.”

Technoblade shrugged. “No more than you have. If anything,” he added, “you’ve been acting mighty odd for a while now.”

“Me?” Sapnap asked, incredulous.

“Techno, really.” Dream spoke again, but was once again ignored.

“Sure. Do you want it in alphabetical or chronological order?”

Sapnap couldn’t believe Techno’s audacity. Ignoring the evidence against him, tossing aside his grievance like it was nothing, then turning it around on him? He stood up, ready to just leave.

“Bruh, you can’t tell me that just that was enough to piss you off,” Techno chided.

“I can’t deal with this guy. Dream? Can you-?” Sapnap gestured vaguely. “I’m just gonna-”

At his friend’s nod, Sapnap turned and stormed out of the room. He felt like the steam coming from his ears was visible to anybody watching. He needed – he needed to cool down.

Peeking around a corner, Sapnap spotted an open door, the harsh wintry wind blowing it wide open. _Jackpot_.

He slowly stalked towards it, peering through to see that it was what he thought it was. A bedroom that led to a balcony. Which meant that – yes, indeed, as he walked out on the balcony – he could get on the roof. _Perfect._

His mind a whirling blaze of anger and confusion and fear and paranoia, Sapnap clambered onto the railing and hopped up onto the roof of the mansion, snow crunching beneath his shoes and already soaking through his pants.

As he stared out into the endless white expanse, only broken by black hints of trees in the distance, he sighed. It was peaceful up here. There wasn’t anybody around for him to be mad at, nobody to incense him or fire him up. He could calm down, sort through his thoughts alone.

It was just – the insinuation that he was that cruel, that _inhuman_ , enough to kill other people? That made him mad – _no, anger isn’t the root emotion, anger is the response, you’ve talked about this with Karl_ – that hurt him. For all his years of being called impulsive and angry, Sapnap wasn’t dumb. He wasn’t mean! He just – reacted faster than others. Which was fine, that was how he processed things. But he hated that that one side of him influenced others enough to color their entire perceptions of him a deep enough red that they mistook it for blood on his hands.

Sapnap never would’ve killed anybody. Decked someone, sure. But he had limits, and those limits stopped before they reached ‘permanent damage.’

He sighed again, watching his breath condense in the freezing air. It was meditative, almost. In and out, focusing only on that little cloud in front of his face. He experimented with different mouth shapes, noticing how breathing out with a ‘hah’ noise produced warm breath while doing so with a manner similar to whistling was cold. It was interesting, a small little activity to get his mind off everything that was going on.

The crunch of snow behind him broke him out of these musings.

Sapnap scrambled to his feet, turning around to see a figure just in time for the bolt of a crossbow to impact his chest and send him plummeting from the roof.

The common room had a cloud hanging over it. More than the literal grey clouds of snow outside, there was a cloud of quiet grief and guilt inside. Wilbur, along with Fundy and George, was stuck in this feeling.

_Was Tubbo right? Had he made yet another mistake? Was he doomed to fail the people that mattered most?_

It sucked, honestly. There wasn’t any lightheartedness to be found, only an equal feeling of doom and gloom coming from his companions.

From the corner of his eye, Wilbur saw a dark shape fall from the roof. This observation was confirmed by the dull _thud_ muffled by the window.

He exchanged glances with Fundy and George. Moving as one, they stood and raced outside.

Nothing good had ever come from surprises in this house.

And the pattern continued, as the falling object was revealed to be Sapnap, laid flat on his back in a deep imprint in the snow. The white powder compacted beneath him was quickly turning red.

The most alarming part, though, was the shaft of a very archaic weapon skewering him through the chest. A thick arrow struck him straight through.

The fall probably hadn’t helped, either.

The trio rushed over, Wilbur skidding to his knees to try to do something, _anything_ to save Sapnap. George behind him, Fundy sprinting over to the opposite side to perform desperate first aid, Wilbur flailed. How was he supposed to fix this?

As Sapnap laid eyes on them, his eyes widened, and he attempted to say something. All that came out, though, were a few gasping noises.

_Fuck. His ribs._

His chest heaved, straining for any sort of air, but it was fruitless. Wilbur could hear a faint whistling noise coming from Sapnap’s torso.

Recognizing his inability to speak, Sapnap attempted to raise his arm, his fingers weakly pointing, but it was too late. His arm never moved more than a few inches from the snow before dropping back down, lifeless.

His scarlet-red blood continued to spread.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cWdoZTh1OWh5M2lqYmdwZg==


	11. Geminus

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy birthday!

Tommy was twelve when he first met Tubbo.

He’d come across another boy in Year 8, just out during their lunch break, and he’d been intrigued by his simple and lighthearted fascination with a bee flitting around. Nothing important, nothing big, just a little bumblebee. In a time when Tommy, along with most other boys in their year, was focused on social standing and proving how grown up he was, it was a breath of fresh air.

He’d stood up, his mates behind him jeering a bit like they expected him to go poke fun, and walked over to the other boy.

“Hey, what’s that?” He’d asked.

The boy had turned, a bit startled, and perked up. “It’s a bumblebee! I don’t know, I saw him flitting around out here, so I came over to say hello! I think I’ll call him Tommy.”

Tommy had snorted. “You can’t call him Tommy.”

“Why not?”

“Because I’m Tommy!”

“I’m Tubbo.”

“Nice to meet you.”

They’d stood in silence for a few moments, just watching the bee, before Tommy pointed out, “What makes you think he’s a boy?”

Tubbo had hummed consideringly. “I don’t know. She could be a girl.”

“If she’s a girl, I think we should call her Clementine.”

“Clementine’s a good name!” Tubbo had smiled then, so bright and full of joy that Tommy couldn’t help but smile back.

They’d been friends ever since.

And after all their years of friendship, all the times they’d spent together, all the hijinks they’d been up to, Tommy was fumbling a bit at the role-reversal they were in the midst of.

Normally, Tommy was the one storming off after yelling at someone.

Normally, Tubbo was the one comforting him.

But normal didn’t apply in a mansion in the woods in the middle of a blizzard superstorm while your friends and family were picked off around you.

Tommy was lost. And Tubbo seemed just as lost to him.

Which led to this situation: Tubbo, storming off after verbally eviscerating Wilbur, Tommy chasing after him without any real idea of what to do.

_He – he wasn’t used to this, okay? Cut him some slack._

“Tubbo!” he called, hurrying to catch up.

Though he wasn’t running, Tubbo was stomping away at a breakneck pace, a few notches from a sprint at the speed he was going. Tommy, with no qualms against actually running, quickly reached his friend’s side, matching his stride with concern on his face.

“Tubbo, come on man, what’s wrong?”

Tubbo didn’t respond. His face was set as still and harsh as stone, a storm as furious as the one outside roiling in his eyes.

This was worse than just-woken-up Tubbo. This was a Tubbo who was legitimately upset, a sight that rarely occurred. In fact, Tommy couldn’t remember a single time he’d seen Tubbo this angry. And he didn’t know what to do to fix it.

“Tubbo, please, man, talk to me!”

Still nothing. Tubbo continued on his course, his eyes never even moving to look at Tommy. He was laser-focused on the floor ahead of them. His fists were clenched so hard that Tommy could see his hands shaking.

_Fuck. Fuck. Damage control. Please work._

Tommy darted in front of Tubbo, momentarily stopping him. He held his hands out. Attempted a smile.

“Ey, Big T, how about you and me just get away from the rest of those guys, huh? Just the two of us, and maybe some snow as well, and all that good shit? What do you say? Huh?”

Tubbo met his eyes for a split second, looked away, and brushed past him.

Tommy was left standing in that same position in the hallway. Turning, he shouted after Tubbo, “Hey, wait up Big T!” He ran again, slowing down once again to stay side-by-side with his friend.

“Tubbo, I – I’m not really sure where we are at the moment,” Tommy confessed. All the hallways started to look the same after a while, but they’d started off down one Tommy hadn’t explored yet. Tubbo’s steps, though, were sure. “Oh – you – you appear to know where we’re going, alright then, I’ll follow your lead.”

Down twists and turns they went, the dark only illuminated by the small candle in Tubbo’s hand. The faint orange flicker cast deep, sprawling shadows from the occasional wall sconces and mounted paintings. As they strode by, Tommy caught glimpses, only glimpses, of a few of the pieces of art. A single ship floundering in the sea, a collection of men with guns dressed in old-timey outfits with a little girl glowing in the middle of them, and a man with wings lying dead while a bunch of naked women cried around him.

 _Art really isn’t my thing,_ Tommy decided. _Too weird and hard to understand. It’s really grim, too. Don’t know why someone would hang these up in their house._

Tubbo led them all the way to the end of the hall, where it suddenly stopped in front of a pair of large wooden doors. They took up the entire width of the wall, easily two feet taller than Tommy, who was no shorty himself.

Tubbo passed the candle over to Tommy.

The doors rose elegantly above them. Carved with intricate designs of wolves hunting rabbits and with thick handles jutting vertically from them, they were certainly an imposing sight. They gleamed with a polished shine that Tubbo quickly disturbed as he braced his hand on one door and grabbed the handle of the other. He grunted slightly as he pulled it open, straining against the heavy weight that Tommy could only imagine. The taller teen stood still for a moment, just taking it all in.

An impatient huff from Tubbo broke him from his reverie and Tommy scurried inside through the small gap Tubbo had made. Tubbo let go and slipped in behind him.

The door slammed shut with a sense of finality.

Candle held up to his face like Ebenezer Scrooge in that one Christmas movie he remembered watching, Tommy gazed around the wide expanse that opened up to him. He couldn’t really see anything, what with the tiny light, but the sheer lack of anything that he could see was already telling about the size of the room.

Without even glancing at him, Tubbo moved past Tommy and down a short set of stairs – only about three – and disappeared into the darkness.

Quick to follow, Tommy heard Tubbo’s shoes click on whatever floor they were on, his own soon following suit after he descended the stairs.

Tommy managed to get close enough to Tubbo to dimly watch him walk to somewhere around the center of the room and then just lay down on the floor. Flat on his back, face to the ceiling. He squished his hands over his face. Then, as Tommy watched with a distant sense of alarm, Tubbo screamed. Not a scream of pain or anything, just a slightly muffled scream that echoed around the room, bouncing back and forth and rolling over itself in Tommy’s ears.

He stepped to loom over Tubbo’s prone form. “Feeling better?”

Tubbo moved two of his fingers enough to reveal one of his eyes. “Kind of.”

Tommy hummed, moving back from his friend and cautiously starting to explore the grand room they found themselves in. Without prompting, Tubbo starting ranting, speaking in the way that Tommy knew meant that Tubbo would be gesticulating wildly with his hands to better express his point, even if it was only through helpless shrugs or hand waving.

“I just – I can’t believe Wilbur! Why would he do that? I get wanting to keep us safe, to an extent, but that’s way too far! We’ve already seen everything, Tommy! We saw Bad and Karl and Phil and Skeppy and Eret! Why would Niki be any different? It’s babying us when we’ve already had to grow up! It just – it makes no sense!”

Tommy grunted affirmatively, running his hand over one of the walls of the room. It was wood, but patterned in a beautiful way he’d never seen before. Was this naturally occurring? He wasn’t sure. It looked more like swirls had been burnt onto thick, solid slabs. As he touched it, the glazed-over bumps and crevices glided under his fingertips like its own form of Braille.

“And the fact that Fundy was there too doesn’t help! He was supposed to understand! We’re partners, right? We’re a part of the same little patrol family. But he just lets Wilbur get away with this? I don’t understand! Surely he, of all people, would want me to be there too for it! He knows how much Niki means to me! Why would he – and I – and just – argh!”

“It sucks, Tubbo, it really does.” Finding a corner had really helped Tommy start figuring out the layout of whatever this room was. Tubbo really had found the center, his voice reaching Tommy from different angles appropriately as he moved about the room. His boots clomped on the floor as he continued tracing his way around, candle held high. “It’s like one of those grown-up things, right? Not that we’re not adults, of course not, but they’re on a whole other level. Give them a different legal title and suddenly it’s ‘Oh no, Tommy, you can’t do that, I’m in charge and I said so.’ It’s really shitty, to be honest.”

“I know, right?” Tubbo’s voice was getting more and more fervent as his rant continued. For him to be _this_ loud, practically foaming at the mouth, well. Tommy was more worried than ever. He turned away from his investigation of the room – a ballroom, he’d determined – to sit back by his friend. “And with all the death and paranoia and just overall _shittiness_ of this whole fucking ordeal, don’t we deserve all the comfort we can get? Can’t we just be allowed to say goodbye? Like _normal_ fucking people? Like people do when they’re not worried about literally being stabbed in the back at any moment? Is that too much to ask?”

“I don’t think so. I think a goodbye is the _least_ of what we deserve after all this.”

“Yeah, I know, right?” Tubbo huffed sardonically. “Jesus.”

Lying back next to Tubbo, their heads next to each other, Tommy asked, “Hey, when we get out of here, what do you want to do first?”

“Like, with my life?”

“No, just in general. First action. We leave, we get to safety, we never come back. What do you do after that?”

“Well, for one, I’d hug my mom really hard.”

“Sap,” Tommy teased.

“Oh, like you wouldn’t do the same.”

His mind distanced itself suddenly, thinking of Phil and his sudden disappearance from their lives. “I think mine would be a bit busy for that.”

“Oh. Right. Sorry.”

“No, it’s fine.” Tommy waved a hand flippantly as if waving away the thought as well. “I think I’d go and get a burger. Like a big, proper one from a fast-food joint. We’ve been eating stew and granola bars so much for the past few days, I don’t think I could ever eat those again.”

“Agreed.”

“Mm, burgers.”

“Milkshakes.”

“Yes! And pumpkin pie.”

“Cake!”

“Tacos!”

“Spaghetti!”

“Ramen!”

They continued listing foods, the mood in the dark room lightening it by several degrees. By the end of their list, as the foods got progressively weirder and weirder (“Escargot!” “Calamari!”), the two boys were laughing. This was so much better than the regular tension that permeated the rest of the group. With Wilbur’s moping around, Dream’s general whatever-his-deal-was, Sapnap’s easy anger, George’s yes-man tendencies, Fundy’s sudden quietness, and Techno’s laser-focus on justice, it was hard to get away from the eternal thought of ‘someone in here killed six people.’ But in this room, ages away from everyone else, with just his best friend for company? Tommy could pretend that they were back at home, laughing at their own stupid jokes and living the lives of regular teenagers. Teenagers who hadn’t seen murder beyond a screen.

But that was imagination.

This cold, cold reality was what they had.

As their latest giggling fit ceased, both boys struggling to catch their breath, Tubbo sighed happily. “Thanks for that, man. I feel a lot better now.”

“It was nothing, Tubbo.”

“Should we head back to the others now?”

Tommy groaned halfheartedly. “Fine, yeah, I guess we should.” He pushed himself to his feet, waiting for Tubbo to do the same beside him. Tubbo sat up, then looked at Tommy. The blond rolled his eyes, then held out a hand and hauled Tubbo upright.

Tubbo wobbled unsteadily on his feet before collapsing back to the floor. He looked up at Tommy, a healthy dose of fear in his eyes. “Tommy, I don’t feel so good.”

Quickly noticing his friend’s alarm, Tommy crouched down. “What’s wrong, Big T?”

“I can’t – I can’t feel my feet.”

“What?” Dread and alarm sent Tommy’s heart rate skyrocketing.

“It’s like they’re not even there, Tommy. I can’t feel them at all.”

“You’re joking, right? Tell me you’re joking.”

Tubbo shook his head. “Would I joke about something like that in a time like this?”

He wouldn’t, and that’s what worried Tommy the most. Tubbo was being absolutely serious, which meant that something was wrong. Really wrong. “O-okay then, let’s go find the others! We’ll get you help, you’ll be fine Tubbo, I – I promise!” His voice picked up speed with his panic.

“I can’t feel my hands, either.”

“No, no, nonononono! Don’t say that, Tubbo! You’re gonna be fine!”

“Tommy-”

“Did – did you eat something? Is this like a weird form of food poisoning?” Tommy asked, raking his hands through his hair, desperate for some way to release the frantic energy now coursing through his veins.

“All I ate was one of Niki’s burnt cookies,” Tubbo admitted shakily.

“God, Tubbo, why would you do that?” Tommy shouted.

“I don’t know! I was worried and her baking always makes me feel better!”

“It was burned! And in the same room where a murder occurred!”

That realization brought the pair to a sudden screeching halt. They looked at each other, Tommy’s fear reflected in Tubbo’s wide eyes.

“You don’t think-” Tubbo asked.

“I do.”

“Oh no.” The brunet laid back on the floor, pressing his palms into his eyelids and quivering.

“Okay, okay.” Tommy wanted to pace, but there were more pressing issues than his need to move. “Let’s – let’s get you up, we’ll go back to the main area, the others are there, surely they can help. Fundy’s there! He’s got that awesome Ski Patrol knowledge, right? And a medkit or something? You’re Ski Patrol, you’ve gotta have a medkit!”

“Tommy.” Tubbo sat up again, laying a hand on Tommy’s. He noted with despair how Tubbo’s fingers weren’t moving at all. It was more like he’d moved his whole arm to drop his hand, rather than delicate maneuvering. “You and I both know that we’re too far to make it back. Especially not with me as basically dead weight.”

“Well, then – we’ll get them to come to us!” Tommy fumbled his way back to his feet, sprinting over to the massive doors and screaming as loudly as he possibly could, “HELP! SOMEBODY, ANYBODY! HELP! TUBBO’S HURT! _PLEASE!_ ”

“Tommy, please, you’re really loud.”

“I – I know, Tubbo, but please. If you’re – if you’re poisoned, then we need to do something!”

“What can we do, Tommy?” Tubbo asked tiredly. “We’re alone, ages from everybody else. Who’s around to hear us?”

“N-nobody, you’re right.”

Tommy sat down numbly, plopping down right next to Tubbo. He stared at his hands. _What good was he if he couldn’t even help his best friend?_

Tubbo shifted from his awkward position. “Will you at least stay with me?”

 _Oh fuck._ He was dying, and this was all Tubbo wanted? Tears brimmed in Tommy’s eyes. “Of course I will.”

Gently, oh-so-carefully, Tommy shifted Tubbo to a more comfortable position, laying him on his back on the ground. Once that was done, he laid down next to him. He grabbed Tubbo’s limp and unresponsive hand in his own. They turned their heads to face each other.

“Can you tell me stories? Something from a happier time? Like earlier, that was nice.”

Tommy hummed, thinking. Finally, a memory popped into his head. “Do you remember, back when we were little, and someone convinced us to go look for four-leaf clovers? Who was it?”

“Robbo, I think.”

“Yeah! Robbo! And he told us something about how they didn’t just make you lucky, the more you had, the luckier you got?”

“I remember.”

“We spent the whole day out in the field by the school, just digging through every plant we could find looking for them. You got distracted by bugs half the time, and I almost gave up at like three different points because I wasn’t finding any, and neither were you. And then suddenly you fall down after getting your foot caught in a little hole because of a butterfly you were chasing.”

“That fall hurt.”

“I bet it did, you twisted your ankle because of it and got a big bruise on your chin. But the thing was, as soon as you opened your eyes, you started shouting for me to come over, and I did. Not because I was worried or anything, definitely not-”

“Absolutely not.”

“Yes, thank you. And then just right in front of your face was the biggest goddamn four-leaf clover either of us had ever seen. We had to call your mom to come get us and take you to the A and E, but we walked into school the next day – well, you limped, kind of, with the big boot you had to wear and the crutches and everything – and we showed it to Robbo and we were _so proud of ourselves_. And then the bastard just laughed! He just laughed and said, ‘I can’t believe you fell for that!’ and we figured out that the whole thing had been a scam the entire time, but we still had the giant clover and I still think we won that day.”

“Mhm.”

“Or when we stayed up until like five am playing Mario Kart and you cheated the entire time.”

“I did not!”

Tommy laughed. “Well, how else do you explain your perfect run on Rainbow Road while I kept falling off?”

“That’s just skill, man.” Tubbo’s responses were getting more and more tired. Tommy tried his best to ignore it and kept talking.

“But we were up way too late when we had school the next day, and Phil was _pissed_ when he found out, but I still can’t erase the memory of you absolutely demolishing me, no matter how much I try. It really hurts me, man. I don’t know why you’d do that to me.”

“You deserved it.”

“Maybe I did, Tubbo,” Tommy replied, quieter than he was used to being. “Maybe I did.”

“Do you have any others?”

“Remember the whole Toob thing?”

Tubbo groaned. “Oh, god, don’t remind me.”

“I’m reminding you. One person mispronounces your name once – and it was an honest mistake! They were a foreign exchange student! Fuckin’, what was his name?”

“Ranboo,” Tubbo admitted.

Snapping his fingers, Tommy grinned. “Yeah, him! That guy! He calls you Toob one time, and then suddenly you decide to create an entire person around it! You just repeated that all day, and walked around with terrible posture-”

“I was imitating you with that part.”

“Oh, fuck off. You know you traumatized the poor man when you show up the next day acting completely normal and like it never happened. And then for ages after, every time we just said ‘Toob’ as a reference to that, you just, like, repeated it back to us like some sort of zombie.”

Tubbo sighed. “Those were fun times.”

“Yeah,” Tommy agreed, “yeah, they were.”

“I’m not going to get any more of those memories, Tommy.”

Blinking back tears, Tommy gripped Tubbo’s hand tighter. “Don’t say that, man. Please, don’t.”

“It’s true, though. I – I can’t feel anything anymore, Tommy. It’s all numb.” His words were slurring slightly like he was having trouble moving his tongue around in his mouth.

The tears slid down Tommy’s face in earnest. “That’s okay, Tubbo. I’m not going anywhere.” He squeezed Tubbo’s hand, a quick pulse like they’d used to, whenever Tommy needed to calm down or Tubbo needed reassurance. He was tearfully reminded of his friend’s current situation when Tubbo didn’t squeeze back. Even when they’d had arguments with each other, however few and far between, they’d always squeezed back. It was a sign of their friendship, that even things like arguments couldn’t tear them apart.

But now Tubbo couldn’t squeeze back.

 _I guess death is something strong enough_ , Tommy thought.

With a voice far shakier than before, since it felt like there were hot shards of glass in his throat from all his repressed sobs, Tommy continued his reminiscing.

“You – you always have been the best friend I could’ve asked for. All my friends before you, they – well, they weren’t the type to stick around. You’ve never wavered, Tubbo. I never once doubted that we were best friends.” Tommy gulped. “And I – I don’t thank you enough for all that you do. I know that sometimes I can be a lot, or that I make fun of you too much sometimes, or go too far, and all that. But that’s never stopped you from being my friend. That’s never stopped you from caring about me. So thank you. And I – I love you, Tubbo. You always have been my best friend, and you always will be. Nobody could ever replace you.”

Through his watery vision, he saw Tubbo smile for a second. “I love you too, Tommy. Thank you.” His voice was barely more than a whisper, faint and dim.

The candle flared lower and lower beside them, burning down its wick.

“Yeah,” Tommy rasped. “There’s no need to thank me, Tubbo. You’ve already done enough for me. All those years with you in my life were the best I ever had. You mean so – so _much_ to me.” His voice finally broke, a small hitch that opened the floodgates.

And where Tubbo would normally reach up and hug him when he cried, he stayed still, because he _couldn’t, because Tommy had failed to protect him,_ and that only made him cry harder.

They stayed like that for a while, Tommy crying softly, Tubbo silent beside him. The only indication that he was still alive was the rise and fall of his chest. Eventually, though, there was a sudden shudder. Tubbo’s breathing grew more labored. His chest moved frantically, like he was hyperventilating.

Panicking, Tommy shifted, grabbing at Tubbo’s hand desperately. He was sure that, could Tubbo feel his grip, it would be crushing.

After this sudden moment of speed, though, the movement of Tubbo’s chest slowed. Where it had been rabbit-fast for a second, now it was barely even visibly.

Tubbo’s eyes were wide, fearful, and Tommy wished with all his heart that he could do something, anything, to make this better. To switch their places, or, better yet, make it so neither of them had ever come here in the first place.

He watched every inhale and exhale with bated breath, fearing the instant it would stop.

His breaths grew shallower and shallower.

Eventually, after what felt like a lifetime, they stopped altogether. Tommy whimpered. Tears dripped down his nose and onto a puddle on the floor.

He turned his eyes back to Tubbo’s.

_They were still moving._

_Oh god he’s still alive but he’s not breathing._

“Tubbo?”

His friend’s eyes, darting frantically around the room from their rapidly paling frame, suddenly fixed back onto Tommy.

Even through his tears, Tommy held Tubbo’s gaze. He watched as Tubbo’s eyes circled his face. They may be the very last part of Tubbo to be able to move. _And he’s using this time to look at Tommy._

Tubbo studied Tommy’s face, taking in every part of his face. Tommy smiled weakly at his friend. There was a small twitch at the corner of Tubbo’s mouth in response – a final attempt at a smile. A final goodbye.

They stayed like that for seconds or hours longer – Tommy couldn’t be bothered to keep track of time beyond the steady erosion of the candle, which was dimming more and more, flickering weakly – just taking each other in for the last time.

Tubbo’s eyes were fixed on Tommy’s, the two holding one final moment of eye contact before their faint fluttering ceased completely.

Tommy didn’t move – he was afraid to move, afraid to break this final piece of his best friend – for several moments after that. He was shaken to his core. A chunk of his heart twisted, knotting tighter and tighter in his chest until he felt like he might just die right here next to Tubbo.

With nothing better to do, alone in the dark with nothing but a flickering candle and his best friend’s corpse, Tommy curled closer to Tubbo, hugging him one final time.

The feeling of Tubbo’s still-warm body next to his, like they were still kids and huddled under the blankets at a sleepover watching scary movies and staying up past their bedtime and still _alive_ , broke Tommy completely. With his best friend held to his chest, Tommy sobbed, a harsh, ugly thing. It wracked his whole body, shaking his shoulders and back in a way that Tubbo hadn’t been able to as he died. That thought made him cry even harder.

Beside them, the candle, now nothing more than a nub, flickered out and died.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Do not separate them.


	12. Gemini

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sggkh%3Z%2U%2Uwlxh.tlltov.xln%2Uwlxfnvmg%2Uw%2U1D6pRTOmPPV5aEFxUOQSkr_1gmNdwv1e_4uSG4U-DZEx%2Uvwrg%3Ufhk%3Whszirmt

For who knows how long, Tommy laid there on the floor, holding Tubbo’s rapidly cooling body. The freezing outside and the chilled floor were sapping the remaining vestiges of heat from Tubbo. No matter how much Tommy wanted to pretend, the cold was proof further than anything else that Tubbo was really dead. His best friend, the one he’d shared so many happy memories with, was gone forever.

That marked two that Tommy had lost in this hellish mansion. First Phil, now Tubbo. It was too much for him to bear. _He’s only sixteen, he shouldn’t have to deal with this._

Tommy laid unmoving for as long as he could, doing his best to deny the reality that awaited him. If he closed his eyes and pretended hard enough and ignored the creeping cold, it was like Tubbo was still there with him.

Eventually, though, the numbness started setting into Tommy’s fingers and _wow he could never think of numbness the same ever again, could he_ and he forced himself to pry his arms from Tubbo’s torso. The teen sat up. He kept his eyes closed for as long as possible, but as he wiped the tears and snot from his face, one lid was pulled open and he couldn’t help but see Tubbo. Tubbo, whose face was frozen in that same final moment. His eyes were wide open, pointed in the direction of where Tommy’s face had been. They were glassy, unmoving and unseeing, but still so very lifelike.

It hurt Tommy to look for too long.

Desperate to feel anything but the cold hands of grief and nature, he stood and started pacing. The blond rubbed his hands together, blew on them, shivered violently. And as he circled the ballroom, his footsteps clacking loudly, he finally managed to mentally shift himself.

The icy grief Tommy felt quickly melted and flared, turning into roaring flames of unbridled rage. Who was this asshole, this abomination of a person, to think that they could just murder innocent people wildly? Without consequences?

They’d made a mistake in leaving him alive, whoever they were. Tommy was furious, steam practically pouring from his ears and foaming at the mouth, and he was hungry for revenge.

“HEY DICKHEAD!” he yelled at the top of his lungs. He received no answer but the echo of his own voice, not that he’d exactly expected one. His fists clenched hard enough that he could feel his fingernails digging crescent marks into his palms, though he didn’t care. “YEAH, I’M TALKING TO YOU, YOU BASTARD! I KNOW YOU CAN HEAR ME! YOU’RE OUT HERE SOMEWHERE! I THINK IT’S ABOUT TIME YOU KNEW THAT TOMMY _FUCKING_ INNIT IS COMING FOR YOU! YEAH, THAT’S RIGHT, BITCH, YOU FUCKED WITH THE WRONG MAN!”

Nobody responded.

“COME ON, ANSWER ME!” Tommy kicked the wall, rewarded only by his foot rebounding off the solid wood. “WHAT GAVE YOU THE _BALLS_ TO TRY THIS OUT, HUH? DID YOU PICK UP A KNIFE ONE DAY AND THINK, ‘OH, THIS SEEMS GOOD FOR STABBING, GUESS I’LL GIVE IT A GO,’ OR WERE YOU ALWAYS THIS FUCKED IN THE HEAD? WHY US? WHAT DID _WE_ EVER DO TO DESERVE THIS SHIT!”

He was practically panting now, blood rushing to his head as he shouted at the top of his lungs. “YOU GOTTA TELL ME, MAN. THAT’S ALL I WANT TO KNOW! WHY? _WHY?_ YOU HAVE _BRUTALLY_ KILLED THE NICEST PEOPLE HERE! YOU COULDN’T EVEN GO AFTER THE ASSHOLES, _NOOO_ , YOU HAD TO PICK NIKI, AND KARL, AND BAD, AND SKEPPY, AND _PHIL_ , AND TUBBO-” Tommy’s voice finally broke, the fervent yelling diminishing as he reminded himself of the newest tally to add to the list of deaths. “ _Tubbo_ deserved this least of all! He’s – he _was_ – the literal nicest guy! His dream was to collect _bees_ , for fuck’s sake! And _that’s_ the kind of person you decide needs to go? I can’t – I can’t – and _Phil_ , he was like everybody’s dad, except not! But he was so ready to be there for anybody who ever came to him! He was a fucking rock, man! Why did _they_ deserve to go? Why-” and here Tommy full on-sobbed, his voice going quiet, barely above a whisper, “Why _them_ , and not me?”

He sniffed, loud amid the eerily quiet ballroom. Taking a moment to collect himself, Tommy pressed the palms of his hands to his eyes and groaned. He stood there, breathing heavily and shakily, occasionally sniffing, for a solid two minutes. When the teen spoke next, it was steady, low, and deadly. “Consider this your warning, whoever the _fuck_ you are.” He lowered his hands from his face. If anybody had been looking, they would have been struck by the embers behind Tommy’s eyes roaring into a bonfire. “I’m coming for you.”

He screamed once, a primal, wordless cry that ripped itself from the shreds of his vocal cords. The sound reverberated, bouncing around the room and layering over itself, until all that was left was a soft noise of agony coming from a thousand voices, then silence.

That done, Tommy stepped back to Tubbo’s body. He glanced at it once, twice, feeling his heart twist itself taut in his chest, before he made the decision to crouch down. With a gentleness that contrasted the rough cry he’d produced less than a minute prior, Tommy pressed two fingertips onto Tubbo’s face and closed his eyelids. Now, if he ignored everything that he’d just gone through, he could imagine the brunet was only sleeping. But he wasn’t sleeping.

And Tommy had a job to do.

Alone in the dark, he stormed over to the heavy oaken door and used his shoulder to shove it open. If he stumbled over the three little steps on the way up, well, nobody was around to see.

Tommy was stranded without any proper light, but that wasn’t going to stop him. He’d spent the past however long in a pitch-black room; his eyes could take whatever awaited him outside. The outlines of objects were dim but still visible. He pressed on.

The ballroom was placed squarely at the end of the hallway they’d gone down, so Tommy made a reasonable decision and began looking through every single door on the way back. Nothing stuck out to him, nothing seemed useful.

There was a room that held nothing but a pool table, the green cloth long turned grey by the layers of dust. Pool balls still sat in their opening triangle, a cue leaning against one side while the rest hung from the wall. It was useless to Tommy, so he moved on.

Another room was nothing but a closet. A few moth-eaten parkas hung from rusty wire hangers. One even had bits of fluff sticking out from it, rips and tears damaging it more than the rest. The fur (was it fake? Tommy couldn’t tell) lining the hood of another black coat was soft to the touch, though Tommy again didn’t linger long. It wouldn’t help.

One room, much larger than Tommy expected, was full of nothing but musical instruments. A series of acoustic guitars hung from the walls, all in pristine and polished condition. There were a few others, though guitars were the main attraction: a small piano, a trumpet, a collection of kazoos (for some reason), a triangle, a small pair of bongos, and more that Tommy couldn’t quite identify. Besides the instruments themselves, plenty of tools and parts meant to repair and maintain them were scattered on a set of shelves on one wall. He noticed there was one spot on the wall, among the guitars – the central position, in fact – that was empty. There were a set of hooks that looked designed to hold something in place, but there was nothing there. Odd, but not what Tommy was looking for.

He wasn’t quite sure what he _was_ looking for, but he had a gut feeling that he’d know it when he saw it.

He paused on his way out of the instrument room, one hand resting in the doorframe. As Tommy tossed a glance over his shoulder, whispering, “Good riddance,” he noticed something small move out of the corner of his eye. His attention thoroughly caught, he picked up the scrap of paper that had fluttered down – another note from the wall falling at the right moment. _Just like Karl_ , Tommy thought.

 _You’re on the right path_.

That was what the note said, in that same cursive writing. Seething, his teeth clenching, Tommy crumpled the note in his fist. The murderer wanted to play games? _Fine. He’ll give him what he wants._

“I’m onto you, you bastard,” he called to the room at large, before exiting and opening the next door down in the hallway.

This one led to an indoor tennis court, the net still hanging from its fastenings. A series of rackets lined the wall, as a single pair of high-up windows illuminated the space. The windows were far too small looking out on a far too dim day to provide enough light to adequately see, but Tommy made it work. His footsteps echoed on the courtroom floor.

Tommy grabbed one of the rackets and a ball, viciously bouncing it up and down before striking it with all his might and sending it flying across the room, yelling wordlessly as he did so. He took another ball and repeated this, then another, then another, until all the balls in their handy bag were scattered carelessly across the room.

Satisfied with his work, Tommy threw the balls closest to him back into their bag, tossing the racket in the general direction of where it belonged. He was about to go when another tennis ball rolled innocently to a stop against his foot. He picked it up.

_Keep on._

The cursive was a little less neat, a few smudges marring the slightly yellowed scrap of paper.

“Is this all some sort of sick joke to you?” Tommy shouted to the court. If this person had gotten this piece of paper onto this tennis ball, then they had to be here, listening, they just _had_ to. “These are our _lives_! There’s no coming back! No simple respawn or back-to-life or any of that shit! What you’re doing is _permanent_ , you know that, right? And yet you continue to choose to – to _kill_ people who have done nothing wrong!” He scoffed. “You disgust me.”

Following the directions of the notes, certain that they were leading him to some sort of resolution, Tommy checked the next room.

The stench was what he noticed first. In this one, there was a cushioned chair (though the chair was worn and the pattern eaten away by time) with a small end table next to it. It was positioned to look at an aquarium, though there wasn’t exactly much going on in there. Under the green coating of gunk, a small brown fish floated upside-down, clearly dead. Bits of its skin had flaked off, leaving sections of exposed skeleton and rotting flesh. Tommy wrinkled his nose.

“What’ve you got for me in here, bitch? Your little dead pet the reason you’re doing this? I’ll tell you something, man, the lives of my family are _not_ a fair tradeoff for a fucking FISH! YOU CAN GET A NEW ONE AT THE FUCKING SUPERMARKET! MEANWHILE, MY FRIENDS, MY _BROTHER_ , ARE DEAD! YOU CAN’T REPLACE THEM! NOT IN A MILLION YEARS! EVEN IF I GOT TO SEE YOU ROTTING AWAY IN PRISON LIKE THAT FUCKING FISH RIGHT THERE, EVEN IF I GOT TO SEE YOU _DEAD_ , IT WOULDN’T BE ENOUGH TO MAKE UP FOR WHAT YOU’VE DONE! NOTHING WILL!”

At the end of his rant, Tommy started scouring the room for another message. This one came in the form of a note stuck to the side of the tank, one end dipped into the murky water.

One hand covering his nose and mouth, the other gingerly going for the paper, Tommy fished out the note.

_Meet_

_Keep_

The other words, one more on each line, were completely lost to water damage ruining the ink. Tommy could vaguely tell that the first was slightly shorter than the second, and, based on context, the second word was likely “going,” but that was all he had. He groaned helplessly. “If you want me to play your sick fucking game, you’ve got to do better than soggy paper, you overdramatic bitch. God.”

Onto the next room.

This one, a narrow staircase with a broken banister, led up to a study. The small room had a second door that led to yet another hallway when Tommy opened it. He sighed, leaving that direction for later. Time to get to looking around in here.

Faint boot prints in the dust and the books and papers strewn about the room served as a sign to Tommy that he wasn’t the first to come in here. He vaguely remembered hearing somebody talk about this room, though his memory wasn’t clear enough to determine who.

Maps hung from the walls, pins taken out of them so they flopped over themselves. The thick mahogany bookshelves were mostly empty; Tommy figured that their contents were what now covered the floor. Only three books were still in place, all of them next to each other in a corner of one shelf: _The Complete Tales of Edgar Allan Poe_ squashed between _And Then There Were None_ and _Atlas Obscura_.

Tommy turned back to the rest of the room. Stepping cautiously around the stacks of books, he moved over to the stately desk in the center of the study, a massive painting of a wave hanging as the centerpiece behind it. He started pulling drawers open.

Most contained only normal desk things: stationery, various writing implements, loose paperclips, and rubber bands. The lowest drawer on the left side, though, contained a series of folders, all of them filled with documents written in legal-ese so thick Tommy didn’t even try to decipher it. The lowest drawer on the right was locked tight. It didn’t even budge, no matter how hard Tommy pulled.

“Is this what you wanted from me, you bitch? Running in circles, chasing shadows? ‘Oh, let’s watch Tommy make a fool of himself, that’ll be fun!’ I AIN’T HAVING IT, BITCH! COME OUT AND FACE ME LIKE A FUCKING MAN, YOU COWARD! I WANT TO LOOK YOU IN THE _FUCKING_ EYES AND ASK YOU IF YOU FELT _ANYTHING_ AS YOU KILLED THEM. I WANT TO SEE YOUR COLD, DEAD EYES MYSELF! I WANT YOU DEAD! DO YOU HEAR ME? _DEAD_!”

Tommy’s eyes darted wildly about the study, scanning and searching for any signs of a response. There was nothing – no note, no message on the walls, none of that.

Now desperate to get some sort of reaction, he started trashing the room. Tommy shoved the books from their neat stacks, he tore papers to shreds, he ripped the maps from the walls. He tried to turn the desk over, but the solid wood was too heavy to budge.

Tommy moved to the bookshelf next, ready to throw the three books left across the room.

 _Atlas Obscura_ hit the opposite wall with a satisfying _thud_.

 _And Then There Were None_ flopped on top of it, pages crumpling as it landed open and facedown.

But as he grabbed _The Complete Works of Edgar Allan Poe_ , he noticed an odd resistance. It felt as if there were some sort of mechanism attached. A faint, very faint _click_ rang in Tommy’s ears as the book rolled itself back in a socket, a clear metal lever sticking into it.

And suddenly, the other bookshelf turned in its place, rotating to reveal an entirely new room behind it.

_Jackpot._

Tommy darted inside this new room, quickly taking in his surroundings.

_Had any of the others who’d been in the study found this room?_

The walls, entirely freezing cold stone, were messily wallpapered with maps and hectic notes. Tommy could make out bits and pieces of that same cursive handwriting, though it was considerably messier. Multiple detailed maps of England were plastered to the wall – one topographical, one a street map, one of the different counties. There was an outline of the whole mansion, floorplan coupled with an overview of the surrounding land, which went on for far longer than Tommy anticipated, considering it was placed squarely on a mountain used recreationally by the public.

There were various grainy photographs of different places around the country. He spotted a few notable landmarks like Big Ben or Stonehenge overlapping with seemingly random pictures of cars on street corners. The pictures all had a line of ripped edges as if they’d been torn from a book and stuck to the wall instead.

Paired with these visual papers were pages of notes, pinned all over the place with seemingly no rhyme or reason. The words were scribbled on harshly, in some places torn. While a few of these notes appeared to have actual commentary on the pictures they were near, such as “London: possibility, but smoggy, polluted,” others bore the same message, repeated. Over and over, as Tommy turned back and forth in the room, the bold words of “Get out. Leave. Go,” pummeled him from every direction. It felt hopelessly targeted at him, even though the sheets were curling at the edges with age.

Additionally, all across the floor were open books: a phone book, various atlases and travel guides, and journals; so many journals. Tommy grabbed one at random and started flipping through it. Though most of the pages at the front were torn out, likely so that they could be hung on the wall, there were still quite a few bound in the leather book. In it, Tommy found an eclectic mix of diary entries, all undated; letters to someone, obviously unsent; and maddened writings that wrote over themselves and left entire pages illegible.

Somewhere in the back of his mind, Tommy remembered sitting with Techno one night, watching one of those true crime documentaries he enjoyed. He remembered feeling bored by it in the moment, but now he was incredibly glad to have been there. Because on that program, he remembered something about a note being key to catching the culprit, but they didn’t have it. What they did have was the page that had been underneath it. Those detectives had used the imprints left on the page to determine the message on the missing one, which had revealed who the killer was.

Taking his note from them, Tommy flipped to the page behind one of the scribbled-out ones and grabbed a pencil from the various writing utensils littering the floor. Ever-so-carefully, he started shading the page. A soft exclamation of “Yes!” escaped his mouth when a few vague letters began revealing themselves.

_There’s an F, and that’s an I, okay, so that first word is “FIRE,” then the line beneath it starts with K…_

A note fluttering down directly onto the page he was inspecting distracted him. The soft patter of bare feet exited the room. Tommy twisted around, but he couldn’t see anybody with him.

_That bastard…they had the nerve to walk right up behind him and mock him like this!_

Snatching the note, Tommy tore out of the room in pursuit of the sound. Out of the study, into the hallway, he searched frantically, but the person, whoever it was, had disappeared without a trace. They were gone.

He cursed loudly. With nothing better to do at the moment, Tommy examined the note he’d been given.

_Retrace your steps, Tommy. I’m sure you want to see your little friend again._

Tommy was seething. They had the nerve to sneak up behind him, they had the nerve to kill people over and over again, and now they had the nerve to mock Tubbo like this? No, Tommy was not having it. “Oh, this is too far, you bitch! I’m fucking coming for you!”

He sprinted back the way he’d come, going past all the doors he’d opened and rooms he’d examined. No, it wasn’t going to be any of those rooms. Tommy had to go straight back to the ballroom, and fast, if he wanted to catch them in the act.

He pumped his legs harder, running faster than he ever had before. Motivation was a powerful thing, and with his best friend at stake, even if he was already dead, Tommy pushed himself to the limit.

Skidding to a stop at those same great doors that he’d opened with Tubbo only a scant few hours ago, Tommy took a moment to catch his breath. But only a moment. Two seconds later, he was pulling on the handle, muscles protesting the weight of the heavy door. The room was still as dark as he’d left it, but Tommy pushed on fearlessly.

The door slammed shut behind him, its deep _thud_ echoing loudly.

A shiver ran down Tommy’s spine, but he ignored it, pushing that feeling aside in favor of burning hot rage.

“Come out, come out, wherever you are! Come on, dickhead, I’m right here! You asked me to be here, and so I deliver! COME ON, YOU COWARD! PUSSY! BITCH!”

“Now, now, Tommy,” a familiar voice called from the center of the room – _right next to Tubbo_ , Tommy’s panicked thoughts told him. “There’s no need for name-calling.”

More of those barefooted steps echoed around the ballroom, their gentle padding so different from the distinct clacking of Tommy’s own footsteps. As the person drew closer, close enough for Tommy’s strained eyes to pick out, he gasped.

“What – how – wait, this doesn’t make sense.”

“Doesn’t it? Oh Tommy, you naïve little child, you have so much to learn.” The man sighed. “Such a shame you don’t have the time.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Do not separate them.


	13. Ezekiel 19:6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So sorry for the delay, dear readers. This chapter fought me tooth and nail in coming out, both in terms of writing it and the timing of several other things. But, rest assured, it is done, and I plan on increasing updating speed from here.
> 
> I do hope you enjoy your time.

As the red of Sapnap’s blood crept through the snow, Fundy grimaced. His hands were just as stained with the fluid, the unfortunate side effect of desperately plunging his hands into Sapnap’s chest in the futile attempt to save him. Fundy, though, had been trained in search and rescue first-aid, which was no substitute for an actually qualified doctor. In some cases, it wasn’t enough. And this was one of those.

There wasn’t anything he could do about it now, though. It was another person gone, another one of their group forever lost to this forest mansion.

He’d never thought he’d become so desensitized to death. Fundy had always been deeply empathetic to others; seeing a loss hit him hard, especially when it was someone he could have helped, an unfortunate reality that came with his job. It had happened rarely, but Fundy still remembered the first time he’d lost someone on the job. He’d gone home and cried about it for hours, before going to sleep and having nightmares about it.

Now, with all the death he’d seen – seven people in three days, half their group already – it felt like a rerun of the same old song and dance. Of course, Fundy offered himself as a shoulder for George, who was trembling with silent tears running down his face, but internally all he could see was the next put-upon funeral and the next night of stress ahead of them.

He hadn’t had time to properly process all the deaths, not with how frequent they were. What had been a horrific shock was becoming terrifyingly close to a new normal for Fundy.

Would this storm ever end?

Even now snowflakes were drifting down, gentler than they’d been at the start of the blizzard but still harsh, and the layer on the ground was thick and difficult to traverse. Fundy couldn’t remember one like it, at least not that he’d experienced.

With a grim nod to Wilbur, who was pale but steady, Fundy got to his feet and reached to grab Sapnap’s shoulders. As if they’d practiced it – who knew, with all the people they’d had to hold funerals for – the pair hoisted the dead man’s body up and began their awkward steps back inside.

George trailed behind them. Fundy could see his gaze fixed on the deep red patch of snow. “George! Come on, man. It’s not healthy to be out here.”

“Yeah, sure, totally,” the shorter man murmured listlessly. He started trudging inside, but his heart wasn’t in it. His feet dragged more than he attempted to lift them above the snow, his arms hung limply at his sides, and George kept glancing back to where Sapnap’s body had lain.

As they had so many times before, with so many different people, they marched Sapnap inside, through the common room, down the hall, past the kitchen, and into that tiny sunroom that served as their cemetery. The walk was long and dreary, another reminder to Fundy of his failure to save so many and the danger that they were still in.

He did his best to ignore the drops of blood that trailed behind them.

He was so cold. Everything was, really. Outside was a blizzard, the inside of the mansion wasn’t safe from the seeping chill, Fundy could hardly feel his fingers or nose, and Sapnap’s body was getting colder by the second. When this was over, Fundy was retiring as a patrolman and living the rest of his life in a pile of blankets with endless hot cocoa and a massive fireplace.

If he never saw snow again, it would be too soon.

Back in the sunroom, Fundy and Wilbur laid Sapnap down in the line of bodies. Wilbur unfurled another sheet and spread it over the corpse. It was all routine now, a choreographed dance that Fundy hated he’d committed to muscle memory. He shuddered.

Wilbur gestured for George to speak, but before he could start, Fundy interrupted. “Wait, wait, guys. We’re not going to do this alone, right? I mean, this is what got Tubbo so upset. Shouldn’t we wait for the others first?”

He jolted. “Actually, hold on. We haven’t seen _anybody_ else in a while. That’s – that’s worrying.” At George’s blank stare and Wilbur’s tilted head, he elaborated. “I mean, Tommy and Tubbo ran off ages ago and we haven’t heard a peep from them since. And Techno and Dream were the last ones with Sapnap, and now he’s dead. Am I the only one seeing the problem here?”

Wilbur shrugged. “As long as Sapnap stayed with Techno, he should’ve been fine. If he split off to be with Dream, well, then, I think that’s our culprit right there.”

“No, I don’t think so,” George responded, his voice dull but getting more energetic by the second. It was as if he was being pulled from a fog. “Dream wouldn’t – he wouldn’t do this, not to our friend. He’s known Sapnap for years, longer than I’ve known either of them. He definitely wouldn’t. Technoblade, on the other hand, well-”

“Oh, no you don’t. Techno wouldn’t hurt a fly!”

“He seemed awfully willing to when he got into a fight with Sapnap not even a day ago!”

“And he had good reason to! Sapnap said we deserved it when our fucking brother died!”

“Yeah, that was a dick move, but I’m just saying that gives probable cause!”

“You can take your probable cause and shove it up your arse!”

“Guys!” Fundy shouted. “This is not the time! Sapnap’s body is right there and four people are MIA! I think the priority should be finding them, not yelling at each other for no good reason!”

George’s eyes suddenly widened. “Wait, wait. If Dream and Techno were left with Sapnap-”

“-and Sapnap is dead now-” Fundy continued, quickly catching onto the train of thought.

“-then what if something happened to either of them?” Wilbur finished.

“Oh god,” George whispered.

“One of them had to have been the one to kill Sapnap, right?” Fundy reasoned. “I mean, Tommy and Tubbo couldn’t have done it, they’re kids. And all of us were together that whole time. Like, it’s the only thing that makes sense. It _has_ to have been one of them.”

“But if it’s one of them, then the other isn’t safe.”

“Shit,” Wilbur hissed. He sprinted off in the direction they’d come. Fundy and George were quick to follow, though Wilbur’s long legs gave him something of an advantage in covering ground.

“Wilbur, wait!” Fundy yelled. “We have to stick together!”

“Well then hurry the fuck up!”

Down the hall they ran, Wilbur appearing to pick their direction randomly. Or at least, Fundy couldn’t figure out his decision-making process in the heat of the moment. As the tallest of them ran ahead, Fundy and George stopped at various doors, slamming them open and scanning frantically for signs of life.

 _Or death_ , Fundy’s traitorous mind whispered.

 _Shut up_ , he whispered back.

Their search appeared fruitless for ages. Neither Fundy nor George could find anything despite their best efforts. A tennis court, a bedroom, a closet, a bathroom, an aquarium long since left to die. None of them had any hint that someone had been there, much less that someone was there now.

Then, a shout. Panicked, painful, coming from further down the hall. Fundy exchanged a fear-filled glance with George. Dread sat heavily in his stomach as he darted in the direction it had come from.

Either something was happening to Wilbur, or he’d discovered that something had happened to someone else. Neither outcome was one that Fundy was looking forward to.

Skidding into the heavy door at the end of the hall, Fundy didn’t hesitate for a second before he heaved the massive thing open and rushed in, George hot on his heels.

Inside this room, it was dark. Far darker than the dimness of the hallway; this was more of a pitch-black. The only source of light was a small orange flame that Fundy recognized as Wilbur’s candle. He shook his flashlight and turned it on. Its light flickered, but it was enough to illuminate a horrifying scene in harsh white.

Wilbur was on his knees, his hands held to his mouth and holding back sobs. Fundy couldn’t blame him. He sunk down beside him.

Lying in front of him was not one, but two dead bodies. Tommy and Tubbo, the fucking _kids_ , the ones who deserved this least of all, were both fucking _dead_.

Tommy was curled on top of Tubbo. Bloody, beaten, bruised, his final resting place was a protective guard for his best friend. There was an odd indentation in his chest as if a piece of it had caved in. A thick line of blood trailed from his mouth, his nose snapped to the side above it.

Tommy had not died peacefully.

Beneath him, Tubbo looked as though he could just be sleeping. Fundy would’ve believed that he was, too, if not for the undeniable fact that Tubbo would never have just sat by while his friend faced such a gruesome end. His slack face was pale, his lips tinged blue; when Fundy shakily reached out to touch him, his body was stiff with rigor mortis.

Oh, Fundy wanted to break down and scream and cry and shout and punch a wall and curl up under his covers and never come out. He let the thoughts happen, let himself indulge in the luxury of grief, before sweeping it all aside for the sake of letting cold detachment take charge. It settled icily in his veins, numbing him inside and out. With a keen eye and a steady hand, the patrolman rocked back on his heels and started examining.

The first thing he noticed was the blood on Tommy’s knuckles. They were bruised and worn down, the skin torn in some places, but there was more blood there than what Tommy’s wounds would have produced.

Some of that blood was not Tommy’s own. As Fundy looked closer, he could see a few drops of blood, partially congealed, next to the pair. And then a few more. And then even more. They formed a trail of sorts, leading away into the darkness. Fundy got up and followed it.

The trail thinned as he went on, getting sparser and sparser until it disappeared entirely, a few feet from the wall. Fundy cursed softly at the dead end before returning to the bodies.

In the time he’d been gone, Wilbur had grabbed one of Tommy’s battered hands and held it tightly between his, a clear note of grief written in the line of his brow and the barely restrained shaking of his shoulders.

Fundy glanced back at the hand Wilbur held. “Can I see that?”

“W-what?” Wilbur sniffed. “My brother’s hand? What the fuck?”

“No, no, it’s nothing weird, it’s just – I have a theory.”

“A theory?” George piped up.

“Well, a suspicion. And if I’m right…” Fundy pried open Tommy’s fist, locked in place by his final movements. He held the contents up to the light. “Aha!”

It was a small shard of glass.

A very oddly shaped shard, to be precise.

With one slightly curved edge, compared to the jagged breaks of the other two. Like a sharper, more sinister, less edible slice of pizza.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” George asked.

“I…have no idea. But he was holding it as he died, surely it’s gotta be significant! He must be telling us something!”

Wilbur reached into one of his coat pockets, pulling out a tiny piece of paper with elegant cursive written on it. “Maybe this has something to do with it?” As Fundy examined it, Wilbur continued. “I found it on top of them when I – when I first got here a-and realized.”

All the note said:

_Shhh_

Fundy looked at the other two men with confusion and hopelessness in his eyes. “Where do we go from here?”

Hours later, grief renewed in all three members of their group, they sat in the common room and just processed. Nobody said a word; the only noises were occasional sobs, quickly stifled.

The events of the day hung over them like the storm cloud outside: grey and gloomy, weighing them down, trapping them further.

Fundy, well. Fundy didn’t know what to do. What was he _supposed_ to do?

Literally every other member of his group was dead. His fellow Ski Patrollers, his _friends_ , we all gone forever. They’d gone from the only group untouched to being picked off in quick succession.

Now Fundy was all alone.

Wilbur had lost another brother.

George had lost his close friend.

And Dream and Technoblade were still unaccounted for.

Fundy couldn’t truthfully say he had the motivation to go find them, though. He just wanted to leave, to go home, fall asleep, and wake up with all this having been a terrible dream. _Please, please, let it just be a dream._

He had a sinking feeling that his thoughts were being echoed by the other two people in the room.

And then, suddenly, with an unbothered air about them, the only other living pair waltzed into the common room.

Dream and Technoblade, looking for all the world as if nothing had happened. Or, at least, that was what their expressions said. The bruises on their bodies and a smudge of red beneath Dream’s nose said otherwise.

Pulling his head from his hands, Fundy asked the two, “And where have _you_ been?”

They exchanged a glance. “Dueling,” Technoblade responded.

“I’m sorry, what now?” Wilbur’s expression was harsh, his arms crossed and his posture unforgiving. “I don’t think I heard you correctly.”

“We were dueling. Fighting. Throwing hands. Whatever the kids call it these days. Actually, wait, speaking of kids, where are the kids?”

“Or Sapnap, for that matter?” Dream added in.

“They’re in the sunroom,” Fundy responded dully.

“The – the sunroom?”

“They’re dead, Dream. All of them.” George pushed his glasses up onto his head, meeting Dream’s gaze and holding it for an uncannily long amount of time. “While you two were gone, we were dealing with THREE FUCKING MURDERS!”

Hearing the normally quiet man suddenly yell threw Fundy. He couldn’t blame George, though. He felt much the same. Those two had been off _fighting each other_? While they’d had to move the bodies and witness the final scene of a pair of _kids_ , they’d been off play-fighting as if nothing was wrong?

No, no, no. Fundy was suspicious as _fuck_.

“I can’t – I can’t believe this.” Techno started pacing small circles, hands tugging harshly at his hair. “No, no, they were fine when we left, everything was _fine_. Sure, sure the kids were a little _upset_ , but they were together. They had to have been. Surely they wouldn’t split up, right?” He glanced at Wilbur, a note of desperation in his too-bright eyes. “Right?”

“Whatever happened, they’re dead now,” Fundy answered bitterly.

“We let Sapnap run off,” Dream whispered. “He got upset, wanted some time to cool off. And we just let him go off on his own.”

“You did what?” George shouted. “Dream, you idiot! We’re in the middle of a fucking murder house! Every single time a person ends up off by themselves, they die! And you didn’t think that _maybe_ that was a bad idea?”

“I didn’t want him and Techno to start fighting in the middle of the room!”

“I’d rather they have fought than Sapnap dying with an arrow through his chest as he falls off the fucking roof!”

“What?” Dream whispered.

“You heard me.”

Seeing the George wasn’t about to explain with any real sort of clarity, Fundy took over. “Dream, we saw him fall off the roof right outside. Through this window, in fact. He’d been shot with a bow of some kind. By the time we got there, he was barely hanging onto life. We – we were there when he died.”

“Oh God.” Dream slowly sank to the floor.

Technoblade paused in his pacing. “Jesus.”

“And Tommy and Tubbo, well.” Fundy glanced over to Wilbur, who took over the explanation. Best to let him explain the loss of one brother to another.

“We’re not quite sure what happened to them, exactly. But when we found them, they were together. Tommy had been beaten. Tubbo was beneath him. He would have been fine, if not for the whole dead thing. The kids are gone, Techno. Both of them.” Fat tears dripped down Wilbur’s face, but he held his head high.

“So, now that you’re all caught up,” George accused, “care to tell the class where you’ve been?”

“Like Techno said, we fought each other. Just as like a way to pass the time. If we’d known-”

“I’m not asking what you would have done. I’m asking what you _did_ do.”

“A simple fistfight should not have occupied all that time,” Fundy added.

“There may have been multiple rounds,” Dream admitted sheepishly. “And then an in-depth discussion afterward.”

“I had visual aids,” Techno added.

“Sure.”

Fundy did not believe them for a second. They couldn’t have missed everything that had happened for that long, they just couldn’t have. A fight? For no real reason? For that long? It was a weak excuse.

_What if the two of them were working together? What if it’s not one killer, but two?_

_Those two have been awfully buddy-buddy, after all._

But with the relationship those two had with Wilbur and George, Fundy was afraid to say anything. He was painfully aware that he was the odd one out in the group. He felt positioned on a guillotine, a blade hanging menacingly over his head.

He wouldn’t surrender, though. He wouldn’t give up. Fundy wanted to live, to survive. He wasn’t about to present himself nicely for execution. He would fight for his right to stay alive.

“So, what do we do now?” Wilbur looked around the assembled group. “Do we just stay here and wait for the storm to pass? Do we leave and risk it? And leave everybody here?”

“We’ve got to leave,” George replied. “It’s not worth staying here, not with a murderer among us. If we leave, we can get out and get help.”

Dream immediately sided with George. “Supplies are running low. We need to leave as soon as we can to stay alive. We can come back for our friends and bury them properly after this is all over. Right now, our priority is saving ourselves.”

“See, there’s your issue, Dream. Even if we do leave, there is still a murderer in the group. It’s very unclear who it is – all of you have alibis and also reasons to be suspicious – but they’d still be with us no matter the location. Supplies would also be in the same state either way.”

“Techno’s got a point. I’m trained in this sort of thing, and even I wouldn’t risk it out there. It’s still a massive storm, even if we’ve gotten short breaks here and there. The weather isn’t predictable enough to guarantee a clear spot for long enough for us to get out. Plus, we’d have to contend with the massive amounts of snow. It’s really hard to get through that stuff, and none of you have the gear for that. I’ve only got one working snowmobile, and it definitely won’t be able to carry all of us. We have no choice but to stay.”

“If we stay, we’re sitting ducks!”

“If we leave, our death is guaranteed!”

“I’d rather die by choice than by random chance!”

“Did you not see what happened to Eret? Snow is a terrible way to go. You would be choosing an awful, slow, painful death!”

“Well then I’d at least have _some_ control rather than all this fucking paranoia!”

“We’d _all_ like some control, Dream!”

“GUYS!” Wilbur yelled.

Fundy and Dream came to a sudden stop in their argument, each of them panting slightly. They’d gotten up in each other’s faces without Fundy realizing it. He backed off, his blood still running hot.

Techno and George were staring at them.

Fundy rubbed his arm self-consciously.

“Now is not the time to let these sorts of things tear us apart. We need to work _together_ to make it out of here alive.” Wilbur dragged one of his hands across his face, stretching his skin in a way that distorted his face in the low light. “I say we bed down for the night. We need night shifts, two people awake at the same time, and we can switch later on.”

“I can take the first shift,” Fundy volunteered. “I doubt I’ll be able to sleep for a while anyway.”

“Excellent. Does someone else want to stay with him?”

“I’ll do it.” Techno stretched.

“Right then. You guys are on until, oh, let’s say three. Fundy, you’ve got a watch, right?”

“Yep.”

“You and Techno wake me and Dream up next. We’ll stay up for the next while, and then one of us can tag out for George.”

“I’ll stay up, you can switch with George.”

“Well, now that we’re all figured out, I’ll see you in the morning, gentlemen. We can decide on a course of action and search for supplies then.”

And Wilbur turned and shuffled into his makeshift bed. So did Dream and George.

Fundy chose to ignore the four rumpled piles of sheets that would be left empty tonight.

His night shift with Techno was uneventful. They didn’t talk, really, just sat and stared. Techno kept looking into the fire they’d restarted in the fireplace, the orange light casting auburn figures onto his face.

Fundy, though, he gazed out the window into the blackness of the night and thought.

As the frost gathered in the corners of the window and spiraled in crystalline fractals, he thought about his missing friends. Despite the jokes they’d make on patrols or their casual play-fighting, he really did consider them a family of sorts. They’d all cared for each other, understood each other in a way that Fundy hadn’t experienced. It came with their shared passion. But that easy dynamic was gone, now. And Fundy was left by himself in a house of near-strangers and dead bodies and a murderer.

As snowflakes continued to rush against the window, he thought about the treacherous journey they’d face on their way out. If they hunkered down a little longer, they could wait for the storm to lessen, and then it’d be safer to hike out, even if there were still deep snowdrifts. If only his radio worked, they could’ve gotten out so much earlier without anybody dying, but the combination of a malfunction in his device and the likely event that high winds and thick ice had disrupted radio towers meant that he didn’t have any way to call for help. They were stuck on their own.

And Techno’s comment had stuck with him. Even if they did manage to make it out, one of them – _at a minimum_ – was still a killer. The group would be at risk as they ran, and what would they do with that person? If they even ever found out which of them it was? Fundy would go to the police, at least, and see what they could figure out. Maybe that would be the solution? Step back, get some therapy, let the police handle it? He didn’t know anymore.

Technoblade coughed a few times from his spot across the room, suddenly shifting about when he’d been perfectly still before. He raised a hand to his nose. Fundy watched with slight alarm as blood began dripping steadily from Techno’s nose.

“You okay, man?”

“Yeah, no, I’m fine.”

“Do – do you need like a tissue or something?”

“That would be appreciated.”

While Fundy quietly rummaged through his bag for a tissue or handkerchief, Techno kept his hand firmly to his nose, though his blood was running at a worrisome rate. It dripped through his fingertips, down his chin, staining his neat white top. Techno ignored all of it.

When Fundy finally passed over a pack of tissues, Technoblade took it gratefully, stemming the bleeding with a handful. He licked the blood from his other hand.

Fundy decided not to comment.

Besides that spontaneous nosebleed, nothing happened. Fundy’s watch ticked on to three in the morning. He nudged Techno from his thousand-yard stare and nodded his head towards the sleeping men. While Techno woke Wilbur, Fundy got the unpleasant task of switching with Dream.

He prodded Dream with his foot. “Wake up. It’s your turn.”

With surprising speed, Dream moved from blearily blinking into clear alertness. Fundy would’ve been impressed, if not for his current dislike of Dream.

The next shift now awake, Fundy curled up in his own bed.

“Hey, Fundy,” Dream tried.

Fundy resolutely ignored him.

“Fundy, I’m sorry, man. I let my emotions get the better of me earlier and yelled when I shouldn’t have. I just – I really hate this, man. I hate that we’re stuck in this place just waiting to see what someone does or if nature decides to like us.”

Fundy didn’t respond. He rolled to the other side to face away from Dream.

“Alright, I get it. I’ll leave you alone. Just, sorry. Again.”

Fundy squeezed his eyes shut and let sleep overtake him.

A new day dawned, though none of them could really see it. Fundy was woken by Wilbur shaking his shoulder. “Ugh, five more minutes.”

“Mmm, no.”

Fundy buried his head in his arms. “I hate you.”

“I know.”

Well, he was awake now, time to face the world. Fundy untangled his blankets from his legs and got to his feet. He yawned and stretched blearily.

“So!” Wilbur clapped his hands together. “Who wants to go supply hunting?”

Dream shushed him. “George is still asleep. It’s really not a good idea to wake him.”

“And why’s that?” Techno asked, one eyebrow raised.

“He either gets grumpy as hell, or he acts like he’s blackout-drunk. Has about as much memory, too.”

“I mean, more eyes have got to be more helpful, right?”

“When George is like that? No way.”

“We can’t leave him alone, though. That’s just – that’s a horrible idea. That’s like the easiest way to get him killed.” Fundy wasn’t sure about this plan.

Dream shrugged. “So I’ll stay with him. All of you will be gone, so that means he’ll be safe.”

“And what if you’re the killer?”

“Number one, no, I’m not. Number two, he’s my best friend. I wouldn’t kill my best friend.”

“I can see you’re gonna be stubborn about this,” Wilbur commented.

“Yep.” Dream popped his lips on the ‘p’.

“So I’ll let you have this. Fundy, Techno, let’s go.”

They left the common room, Dream plopping down on the couch as they went. Fundy really didn’t like this plan, not with all the suspicion he had on Dream, but he was cornered. He was the odd one out in the group – if he spoke out against the majority opinion, if he disagreed too much, he didn’t have anybody who’d defend him like everybody else did. Dream and George were a package deal, and Wilbur and Techno were literal brothers. Fundy had nobody.

And the image of Eret, tossed out in the cold and then frozen stiff in that tiny room, had never managed to leave his head.

He didn’t want to be the next Eret.

But seeing Dream lounging casually on the couch, he couldn’t help but fear for himself and George.

As they continued down the hall, Techno laid out a plan. “No matter if we’re staying in this house or not, we need to find more supplies. Blankets, clothes, food if you can. We split up into different rooms, but we always stay in the same hallway. Doors next to or across from each other. If you need help, shout for it. There’s three of us, there will always be someone there to help.”

With that cheerful summary, Techno swung the first door open and began searching through the parlor inside. When he saw Wilbur and Fundy standing by, just watching, he sighed. “Well? What are you waiting for? Go, go!”

Slightly harried, Fundy opened the door across the hall and went inside. Wilbur went next door.

In about five minutes of looking through the small bedroom, he didn’t find much helpful. The bed was stripped of all linens, the closet was empty, and Fundy would’ve been shocked if there was any food.

He exited, seeing Techno and Wilbur waiting for him. Both their arms were empty.

They kept looking.

Down the hall, they kept to their pattern, never finding more than a few ratty blankets or hole-filled clothes.

Eventually, just as Fundy was exiting another bedroom, he ran directly into someone. “Dream?”

Yes, the green-clad blond was there, with the group, standing in the middle of the hallway. Fundy was immediately on guard. “What are you doing here?”

“Well, George woke up, told me to fuck off, and went back to sleep. He’s been mad at me since yesterday, so I figured I’d give him space.”

“And you didn’t think that was a bad idea?” Fundy half-yelled incredulously. He couldn’t believe what he was hearing. Did Dream have _any_ sort of thought process?

“Okay, listen, if the murderer is one of us, then we’re all together, and then nobody is with George, so he’ll be fine. I’ll be keeping my eyes on everyone – if any of you leave, I’ll know.”

“Fucking – ugh – _fine,_ Dream, whatever, not like I can stop you. Wilbur!”

The man in question poked his head out of the closest door. “Yes Fundy?”

“Dream decided to come with us.”

“So, George is alone?”

“Yep.”

“Whose idea was that?”

“Dream’s.”

“Look, the murderer’s got to be with this group. As long as we’re all together, I can keep an eye on everyone, and George is fine either way.”

“And what if it was you?”

“It’s not me.”

“Alright, I’m going back to check on him,” Fundy decided.

“He’s _fine_ , Fundy. The supplies are more important right now.”

Fundy grumbled, but went with it. He kept feeling like he was putting himself into more and more precarious positions with the group. If he said the wrong thing, would they toss him out like they’d done to Eret?

 _From now on, he’d keep his head down, stay safe_.

_That was all he could do._

Their search continued. Further down their hall they went, popping in and out of rooms, but, well. They never found any food at all, all the clothes were too big on Fundy and too worn down, and the blankets were either thin sheets or so ratty and moth-eaten that they were useless anyway. Fundy was beginning to think the house itself wanted to spite them. He kicked the corner of a doorframe as a bit of revenge.

However, this simple and boring search was brought to an abrupt standstill when Fundy entered the next room. It was an office of some sort, but what grabbed Fundy’s attention was what was sitting in pride of place on the desk.

A finger.

A literal human finger, still oozing blood from its stump.

A small note, stained red on the corner, was sitting beneath it.

 _Humpty Dumpty_ , it read.

“Oh fuck. Oh FUCK! GUYS! We’ve got a problem!”

Dream, Techno, and Wilbur rushed in, coming to a stop behind Fundy. He gestured hopelessly at the severed phalange.

“What the fuck?” Wilbur hissed.

“What the fuck?” Dream exclaimed.

“Well, that’s not good,” Techno commented.

“I’m pretty sure everyone here is still in possession of all their fingers, right?”

They all held up their hands in response. All ten fingers on each pair of hands, present and accounted for.

Fundy turned to glare at Dream. “Now who was the one who said that George was fine, huh?”

“Woah, woah!” Dream held out his arms in supplication. “We don’t know that this is George’s!”

“Yeah?” Fundy grabbed the finger and waved it in Dream’s face. _So much for keeping his head down._ “Because he’s the only one who’s not here! He’s the only one this could belong to! Look at it! It’s fresh! It’s still bleeding! This is _recent_ , Dream, and George is MIA!”

“Wait, if this is George’s finger, then where’s the rest of him?” Wilbur asked.

Fundy’s arm went limp. The finger fell from his grasp, plopping onto the ground and rolling for a bit. “Shit.”

“Alright, new plan! Screw the supplies, we’re looking for George, right now!” Techno ordered.

What began was the most horrific and gruesome Easter egg hunt of Fundy’s life. They scrambled around the mansion, re-checking rooms they’d entered and finishing their survey of this hallway. Tucked into nooks and crannies were pieces of George – never the whole man.

Wilbur found an eye floating in a fish tank next to a rotting cod.

Techno found a whole calf stuffed into a closet.

Dream found a clump of hair on the bed where George was supposed to be.

Fundy found the left hand to which the finger belonged, the pinky finger missing, in the room that Bad had died in.

Wilbur found an ear sitting in front of a door leading outside – Dream said it was the one their group had entered from.

Techno found a chunk of meaty intestine wrapped around a banister like a gory garland.

Fundy found a foot tucked into a bookshelf.

And Dream, well.

Dream found a heart.

Next to it were George’s signature white-and-black glasses.

He grabbed them, ignoring the blood on them, and held them close to his chest. Dream stumbled back to the wall, colliding with it with a small _thud_. He slid down it, reeling.

As hard as they searched, they never did find any more pieces of George.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=guPGVPTY_bA&ab_channel=CakeEntertainment


	14. 15-03

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't believe how much I'm writing. When I started this fic, I thought it'd take me until March.

Exhausted, both physically and emotionally, Fundy sat down heavily on the couch in the common room. The group – _the only four left_ – had searched the house high and low, and yet they’d only found these few pieces of George. They were desperate to find him, to give him the proper rest he deserved, but in the end, it was too much. Even Dream, the most insistent of the group, had relented. They weren’t going to find any more of George.

Fundy looked down at his hands. Small flakes of red clung to them, bits of blood from the gory viscera they’d found. _Would his hands ever be clean again?_

All this blood, all this death, and all he got for it was blood on his hands and grief in his heart.

“I don’t understand,” Fundy rambled helplessly. “Why? Why is this happening to us? What did we do to deserve this?” He looked up, making watery eye contact with Wilbur. “Surely we must have done something, right?”

“I don’t know anymore, Fundy,” Wilbur whispered back.

“No.” Techno’s voice was firm, resolute. “We did nothing wrong. All we did was take shelter in a storm. This is a sick, evil person doing something just because they can. That is it. End of story.”

“Are you sure about that, though?” Fundy asked.

“I have to be.”

Fundy sighed and hung his head again. Absentmindedly, he started scratching at the spots of blood on his hands.

“Now, we _need_ to figure out who did this. We don’t have safety in numbers anymore. That’s been proven unhelpful over and over by now, and the person who did this is obviously bold.” Wilbur turned his head sharply to Dream. “Anything to say for yourself?”

“What – _me?_ ” the blond asked incredulously.

“It’s literally the only thing that makes sense. The rest of us were all together. It was only you with George, and now he’s scattered into a thousand pieces.”

“Woah, woah, woah, hold on, no! George was my best friend! Why the fuck would I do that?”

“I wouldn’t know, Dream! I don’t make any claims to know how your twisted fucking mind works!” Wilbur accused.

“You were the last one with George,” Techno admitted.

“But I couldn’t have done any of the other murders! I was _with you_ when the kids were killed!”

“And…you did seem very enthusiastic about sending Eret outside,” Fundy added, his words gaining strength as he went.

“Your emotions have been all wrong this whole time, Dream.”

“I – I don’t even know how to respond to that.”

“It’s all adding up!” Wilbur shouted, running his hands through his hair and pacing back and forth. “Your cagey behavior, your convenient appearances, all of it! It was you all along, wasn’t it?”

“No!”

“It _has_ to be!”

“It’s _not_!”

Fundy butted in. “I don’t believe that for a second, Dream.”

“Come on, Techno can vouch for me, can’t you, Techno?” Dream was almost pleading.

“No, no, Techno, you _know_ , don’t you? Just like me and Fundy, you _know_ that it can’t be anyone else.” Wilbur’s eyes were alight, though with what Fundy couldn’t say.

Technoblade looked back and forth between the two of them, caught at an impasse, before he sighed. “Even if you were with me when the kids died, that’s nowhere near a clear for literally everything else. I’m sorry, Dream.”

“No, no, don’t be!” Wilbur kept his voice raised. “No use in wasting apologies on a killer right? I mean, how ruthless do you have to be to frame someone else for your crimes and toss them to the elements?” He tapped a graceful finger on his chin. “I’m curious, though. Were your little friends in on it? Did George and Sapnap know about all you did? Were they your little helpers? Or did they find out suddenly, and you had to keep yourself in the clear?”

“No – I – I would never!”

“Oh, I’m sure you regretted it when you did the deed. You sure were attached to the two of them. But someone as fucked in the head as you are can’t properly feel guilt. A passing feeling, like indigestion, eh Dream?”

Fundy was feeling a little put-off by Wilbur’s sudden intensity. It reminded him far too much of how he’d acted when he threw Eret out. The same aura of righteous fury mixed with a hint of malice permeated the air. And, like a priest leading a witch hunt in the days of old, Wilbur pointed all this squarely in the direction of Dream.

But as conflicted as Fundy was feeling about Wilbur’s actions, he couldn’t see anybody but Dream as the guilty party now. It all lined up! Especially Dream’s whereabouts that morning – it literally couldn’t have been anybody else. Fundy had been there with them! All in that same hallway, only a door apart! There was no way that any of their group could’ve gotten to George.

The evidence pointed far too damningly in one direction.

“Fuck you, Wilbur,” Dream gritted out. His hands were clenched tightly at his sides, his face flushed red. Despite all the accusations pointed at him, despite the group sentiment turning against him, the only emotion Fundy could see written on the blond’s face was hot, seething anger. “Fuck you for doing this. Fuck all of you for believing him! You’re all fucking sheep! Jesus, it’s like you don’t have a shred of brainpower to figure things out for yourself! You just follow whoever’s the loudest!”

He stood abruptly from his seat, striding over to the fireplace and standing on the elevated hearth. “Well, I hope you enjoy the slaughter, sheeple. I’m not taking this! I won’t let you do to me what we did to Eret!”

With that grim declaration, Dream leapt from his spot, flipping neatly over Wilbur’s attempts to grab him. He landed on the couch, leaning down for a split second to grab his bag and sling it over his shoulder before he bounced back into the air. In a stunning display of athleticism and acrobatics, Fundy watched, awestruck, as Dream flew across the room and landed in a neat roll. He didn’t miss a beat as his momentum carried him back to his feet. In a flash, Dream was gone, sprinting out a door and down the hall.

“No!” Fundy shouted, scrambling to chase after him.

“Enough, Fundy.” Wilbur rubbed a hand across his eyes, the aura around him dissipating. Like air being let out of a balloon, he deflated, once again back to the normal guy Fundy had gotten to know.

“But – Wil, we’re letting him get away!”

“And when he’s not here, he can’t hurt us. We can plan our escape without revealing anything to him. We’re safe.”

“I mean, we’re not gonna be safe until we’re as far away from him as possible.”

“Thank you, Technoblade, for that ever-so-reassuring addition.”

“Hey, I’m just telling it like it is.”

“Fine,” Fundy agreed reluctantly. He glanced back to the door Dream had escaped from. “But, for the record, I’m not happy with it.”

“Noted.”

Techno grabbed one of Fundy’s hands. “Hey, you good, man?”

“What?”

Techno nodded at the hand he held. Somehow Fundy, in his distraction and stress, had scratched away at his hand until it bled. Rather than removing the blood from his hands, there was more than ever. He hissed, suddenly aware of the pain.

The pink-haired man led him back to the couch. Fundy sat down and watched as Techno pulled a roll of bandages from his pack. “You’ve really got to be more aware of that, man.”

“I can’t help it! When choosing between confronting a literal murderer and thinking about what my hands are doing, which do you think I’ll pick?”

“Yeah, here it’s fine. But if this keeps happening, that’s a pretty bad sign. Trust me, I’d know.”

“You’d know? What does that mean?”

Techno sighed. “Ask Wilbur. I’m not in the mood to answer that question.” With that, he finished wrapping Fundy’s hand, securing the bandage with a quick knot. He stepped away, flopping down onto the opposite couch and quickly falling asleep.

Curiosity brimming, Fundy looked to Wilbur. The tallest of the group was facing the fireplace, one hand bracing himself on the mantle. He was staring at the lifeless fire, the logs burnt and blackened. “Uh, Wil?”

Startled from his reverie, Wilbur spun to face Fundy with a hand pressed to his chest. He breathed out harshly. “Damn, Fundy, you scared me.”

“Sorry.”

“No, no, it’s fine, I was zoning out. What’s up?”

“Um, what did Techno mean when he said he’d know?”

“Know about what?”

Fundy held up his newly bandaged hand. “Well, he was talking about me scratching my hand up without noticing, and he said that was a bad sign? And that he’d know. And he said to ask you.”

“Right. That.” Wilbur sat down on the floor, leaning back on the couch Techno was currently asleep on. “So, basically, when we were kids, Techno started acting really weird out of nowhere. It was like he was a normal kid one day, and the next, he suddenly started struggling to tell the difference between what was real and what wasn’t. Before, the oddest thing that you’d really see from him was a lot of anxiety and him sometimes repeating what other people were doing – copying them, basically. Turns out he couldn’t control it.

“I still remember the first day that we really realized something was wrong. We were ten or so, and we woke up to get ready for school, except he was convinced he was still dreaming. He started wandering to the window, pulling it open, because he’d been dreaming about flying – you know how kids do – and he wanted to get back to it. Except he wasn’t dreaming anymore. I called for help, Phil came running in, and we pulled him away from the window.” Wilbur shivered slightly, leaning his head back onto Techno’s leg. “We thought it was a one-off. But then he started having random moments where he’d break down panicking. He’d start telling us to shut up, and even when we weren’t saying anything, he’d keep saying it.”

Avidly listening to Wilbur’s story, Fundy pulled out his radio from his backpack and started fiddling with it. It hadn’t worked since the blizzard set in, but he was hoping that maybe he could fix it.

“We weren’t the ones he was telling to shut up. He was having auditory hallucinations. Basically, he heard voices. He told us he couldn’t keep track of them all, there were so many, all telling him so many different things. Sometimes they were nice to him, sometimes they spouted random things, and sometimes they berated him and told him to do better. It got really hard for him to do a lot of things: school, sports, clubs, you name it, because so many times, he was told that he wasn’t doing well enough, even though he was top of the class in everything he did. We took him to a psychiatrist. We didn’t know what else to do, really. They diagnosed him with schizophrenia, said it was something that he’d have to live with, since there wasn’t a cure. There’s therapy and meds and shit, but that’s just kind of meant to reduce the symptoms. We’re lucky that we caught it early. We got him help quickly, and that’s helped make it easier for him.

“He’s doing better. But there was a long period of time when he was away at college – the first time he was away from the family for any extended period of time – that things got really bad. He ran out of his meds, and he hadn’t realized it in time. So, because of the really bad anxiety that he got, he didn’t go out for a refill – he was afraid of being told off for it, right? Without the meds, the voices started coming back stronger than ever. It was fine for a couple of days, but then they picked back up like they’d never left. And he started doing things unconsciously because he couldn’t tell over the noise in his head and he needed reassurance that he was real. Things like scratching at his skin until he bled – like you, right now. Now, that’s not to say that you’ve got schizophrenia, because I really doubt it, but it’s usually a sign that something’s up. It’s a kind of grounding mechanism, but a really unhealthy one, because you’re hurting yourself in the process. So that’s him saying that he’s worried about you. The scratching was always a sign that something bigger was up.”

Wilbur looked at Fundy intently. “I don’t think I need to ask what the ‘something bigger’ is.”

“No. No, you really don’t.” Fundy sighed. With his radio in multiple components around him, he could finally start looking for the root issue.

“I’m worried about him. This place really hasn’t been good for any of us, but I’m really worried about how it’s affecting him. He bottles things up a lot, so it’s hard for us to tell. But, well. We didn’t bring enough meds for this whole stay. If we don’t leave, and soon, it’s not going to be good for him.”

The pair descended into silence. The only sounds permeating the common room were Techno’s gentle snores. Wilbur shut his eyes, looking almost asleep himself. Fundy sat and worked on repairing his radio.

Time passed. Fundy wasn’t sure how much between the eternal grey of the outside world and his focus on his work. He kept working with the small pieces, looking for any parts that were cracked or broken. When his eye finally caught on one, he cursed loudly.

Wilbur and Techno stirred, both finally returning to the waking world.

“Huh? What? What’s wrong?” Techno grumbled, already mostly awake but not looking like he was enjoying it.

“My radio.”

“A radio? Why didn’t you use it earlier?”

“I wish I could use this, but since the ice probably messed with the radio towers, we didn’t have any signal. I don’t know if any have been fixed, but it’s useless now anyway. The transmitter isn’t working properly – I can’t send any messages out. We’ve got dead batteries, but I’ve got some spare. I could get this thing on, but it wouldn’t help.” Fundy kept fiddling with the parts. He picked up the transmitter and showed it to the brothers. “Like, here, this part? It’s a crystal oscillator, it’s used in a radio to keep the frequency stable. It’s a pretty important part of the transmitter. But, for whatever reason – temperature, a hard hit, it just got old – mine isn’t working anymore.” He descended into angry muttering. “Stupid budget cuts.”

“Oh, I’ve got one of those.”

Fundy’s head whipped towards Techno. “I’m sorry, you have a what now?”

“I’ve got one of those. In my bag.”

“I – nope, never mind, I’m not gonna look a gift horse in the mouth.”

Techno reached into his apparently magical pack, scrounging for a bit before emerging with a tiny part: an AT crystal oscillator. Exactly what Fundy needed. “What do you know.”

Fundy quickly snatched the piece, clicking it into place on the transmitter. He replaced the batteries with a spare set from his own bag. With deft and practiced fingers, he reassembled the radio.

As he finally snapped the back of the radio into place, he held his breath. Wilbur and Techno leaned in as well, hoping to finally get some good news in this horrific mansion.

Fundy flicked the switch.

The radio turned on.

It produced only static, but it was still progress. He had a functioning radio! “It works!”

Wilbur and Techno whooped with joy. The trio stood up and hugged each other tightly. “I can’t believe it! Look at you go, Fundy! And Techno! I can’t believe you had exactly what we needed!”

Caught up in the joy of the moment, Fundy started laughing. He was excited! Sue him! He’d live out his life as a poor man, that’d be fine by him, because he’d be alive and _okay_! Soon, that laughter turned to breathless tears, Wilbur and Techno still holding onto him tightly. Fundy would make it out alive, so would Techno and Wilbur, but that was so few compared to everybody who’d showed up here. All of them had lost so many people. They were going to be okay, but nobody else would receive that same gift.

Fundy resolved that, as soon as he made it out, he was going to call somebody to come out here and give everybody who’d died a proper burial, someplace that wasn’t the same spot they’d died.

He gave himself a few moments to recover from his sudden outburst of emotion. “Okay, okay. The radio works. It just has a shitty fucking signal.”

“Well, can you fix it?” Wilbur asked, a bit of panic returning to his eyes.

“This sort of thing? It’s a lot easier to jury-rig than a crystal oscillator, that’s for sure. Techno, you got any long electrical cords in that magic bag of yours?”

Techno pulled out a USB cable and a CAT 5 cord. “Will either of these work?”

“Gimme the CAT.”

Fundy took out a pocketknife and sawed one end off the cable, exposing the copper wiring inside. He folded most of them to the side, spinning about five strands together into a thin bundle. That step done, he took the bundle and stuck it into the antenna port of his radio. “Boom. Done.”

“That was…a lot simpler than I expected,” Wilbur admitted.

Fundy’s heart raced. Pitter-patter, rabbit-like, it beat a staccato melody of joy and relief. “Guys, we’re getting out of here, we’re gonna be okay!”

The signal from within the house would be weak, even with the help of his makeshift antenna. He needed to get higher. Without further ado, Fundy sprinted for the door, running up the stairs and sprinting to the first room with a balcony he could find. He could hear Techno and Wilbur trying to chase after him, but he was far too exhilarated to care. They were going to make it!

On the balcony of a simple bedroom, he clambered onto the railing and hopped onto the roof. With all the grace of the trained professional he was, the patrolman scaled the slope, hoisting himself onto the roof over the third story of the house and balancing on the top of it.

His radio was clutched in a death grip in one hand, the cord in the other. Without care for his somewhat precarious position, Fundy raised the cable as high as he could. He turned the radio on.

Though the first sounds filtering through were static, if he really tried, he could pick out vague snippets of voices. Voices! People! He listened closer.

“-sweep left side of-”

“-any signs-”

“-keep looking-”

“-missing patrol-”

“-find them-”

They knew that Fundy and his patrol were missing. And they knew! They were looking for them! Oh, Fundy was so happy he could practically cry. They were going to be okay!

He strained just a bit more. The voices cleared up just a bit further.

“-blizzard expected to clear-”

“-matter of hours-”

“-get them home safe-”

It was perfect. It was so perfect. Fundy was on top of the world. He lifted the radio to his mouth, ready to send out the SOS and get them home safe.

A sharp sensation of pain in his back sent his fingers into numbness. The radio slipped from his grasp and slid down the rooftop slope. Fundy gasped slightly.

The knife slid out of his back. Fundy collapsed, barely clinging onto the roof. He tried to reach for the radio, their salvation, their last hope. His vision was blackening at the edges.

A foot, clad in a boot, stomped onto his hand before he could grab it.

A hand snatched the radio. “I’ll be taking this, thank you very much.”

Fundy succumbed to the dark.

They’d lost Fundy in his mad dash for who-knew-where. For all that he was shorter than both Wilbur and Techno, he was quick. Wil had last seen Fundy darting around a corner into the staircase to the second floor, so that’s where he led Techno.

Wilbur didn’t know where he’d gone from there, though.

He turned into a bedroom that seemed promising, the door slung open wide and the one leading to the balcony banging in the wind. “Techno! Over here!”

They arrived at the balcony, eyes catching on Fundy’s boot prints leaving deep indents on the snow on the railing, just in time to watch his body plummet from the roof.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Getting serious for a moment, breaking the Author persona, I really do hope I characterized schizophrenia well. It's always very important to me that I portray mental illness realistically because the stigma surrounding it is absolutely awful and I want to reduce that. I researched beforehand and as I wrote, but as a person who hasn't personally experienced schizophrenia, I am very aware that I could have made an error. If there are any points that you see something inaccurate or offensive in my depiction, please let me know and I will fix it as soon as possible.


	15. The Mortal God

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Blood for the blood god.

“Fuck! Fuck, Techno, we were so close!” Wilbur pulled at his hair desperately, turning from the balcony railing. Techno stayed put, leaning to peer over the edge. “How did we – we must have _just_ missed it, what the fuck!”

“Wilbur.”

“We looked away for one second, Techno. _One second!_ ” Wilbur pointed his finger in Techno’s face just to emphasize his point. “He literally just left us for a second! That’s all it took!”

“It was more like a few minutes, but sure,” Techno murmured.

“And would you look at that, suddenly it’s just the two of us with that fucking maniac who-knows-where in the house!”

“Wilbur-”

“God, Techno, what are we gonna do now?”

“Well, if you’d listen to me for a second, I could offer an answer.” Techno’s face was deadpan. He raised an eyebrow as Wilbur fell silent. “Are you ready to listen now?”

The taller brother nodded.

“Good. Here’s the plan: Fundy may not be dead – we could still have a chance. Like Sapnap when he fell from the roof – you said he was still alive when you got to him, right? But there’s also the chance that Dream could be up there or somewhere close by.”

“Techno, I swear to God, if you’re telling me that we should split up, I’m going to kick you. Historically, that has not gone well.”

“But we’ll have something they don’t.” Techno flourished a pair of small handheld devices from where he’d pulled them from under his cloak. He tossed one over to Wilbur.

“Techno. What the fuck is this.”

What Wilbur now held in his hand was a small walkie-talkie. But not just any walkie-talkie, no. It was a bright fluorescent pink, accented with bits of an equally neon purple. It had a thick blue antenna protruding from the top. And, worst of all, plastered directly to the front of it was a sticker of Dora the Explorer. It was a children’s toy.

Techno shrugged, brandishing his own Dora-themed walkie-talkie. “It’s what I had on me. Would you rather no communication at all?”

“No.”

“Then you deal with it and speak in the pink radio.”

“How did you even get these? When?”

“Don’t ask questions, Wilbur.” Techno tapped his nose slyly.

“Why are you like this.”

Despite the lighthearted banter they shared with the familiarity of an old blanket, there was still an uneasiness pressing down upon the brothers. Wilbur’s quips fell flatter than usual, Techno’s voice had more of a monotone, and both fidgeted with the switches on their walkie-talkies. 

The storm looked like it was letting up. The snow fell with less fervor onto their heads. Wilbur could start picking out actual snowflakes instead of the clumps of sleet that rocketed downwards. For once, on some basic impulse, Wilbur stuck out his tongue. Techno huffed at his brother, though the taller of the pair was eventually rewarded with the telltale feeling of freshly melted water on his tongue.

The trees still bowed under the weight of the heavy blankets on their branches. The drifts still littered the grounds around the mansion. Wilbur couldn’t see any of the footprints he knew he’d left behind the day prior.

Still, the signs of the storm breaking were ones of hope. Despite the bleak situation Wilbur was trapped in with only one of his brothers left, maybe, just maybe, they could make it out. Fundy had made a radio. He might have a snowmobile that still worked buried somewhere under the snow. If luck turned their way, they’d make it out.

They’d be okay.

First, though, was the situation at hand.

“Are you sure about this, Techno?” Wilbur asked, an uncharacteristic note of anxiety in his voice. It wavered slightly. He didn’t meet Techno’s eyes, instead scanning the white snowscape around them.

“I don’t know anymore.”

That, more than anything, showed Wilbur just how lost his brother was. Despite how much he’d looked up to Techno as they grew up, how much he’d seen him as the one who had all the answers, Wilbur was very aware of Techno’s shortcomings.

Technoblade never admitted when he didn’t know something.

Caught up in the emotions of the situation, the sheer amount of loss, the desperation, the fear, paranoia, suspicion, terror, horror, mixed with moments of bonding with those ten strangers, Wilbur did the only thing he felt he could do.

He strode over to his brother, his _twin_ , and hugged him as tightly as he could.

When they were kids, Techno hadn’t been one for lots of contact. It made him uncomfortable, he confessed to Wilbur one quiet night under the covers. However, Techno still wanted reassurance, comfort, affection. Their family had learned to read his nonverbal cues to figure out when Techno wanted contact and when he couldn’t stand it.

The set of his shoulders, the clench of his jaw, the quick _pitter-patter_ of his fingers on the walkie-talkie, all of it pointed to a Techno who needed reassurance. And, well. Wilbur needed it too.

The reassurance that Techno was alive.

The reassurance that they still had each other.

The reassurance that they could make it out okay.

They stood there for several moments, huddled as close as they’d been when they were still kids, innocent and unscarred. Wilbur pressed his face into Techno’s shoulder, taking in the blessedly warm body that meant that Techno was still alive.

Phil had been so cold.

Tommy had been far below human temperature.

Techno still felt like a radiator.

Taking one final deep breath, Wilbur finally released his brother. He put his hands on Techno’s shoulders, holding him in place. His gaze was steady and firm as he looked into Techno’s eyes. “Stay safe, Tech. Please.”

“You too.”

Wilbur switched on his walkie-talkie, pressing the ‘talk’ button and hearing a click from Techno’s. As he spoke a simple “testing, testing,” he heard his own muffled voice echo back at him.

Only partially satisfied with the arrangement, Wilbur nodded a final time, saluting to his brother as he walked back inside the house.

The very instant Techno was no longer in his sight, Wilbur’s walkie-talkie lit up with static as Techno’s voice played through it. “Go check on Fundy, Wil. I’m checking the roof.”

Even though they’d figured this out, Wilbur was still nervous. “What if Dream’s still up there?”

“Do you think that green punk could take me?” was the buzzing reply.

Wilbur snorted and snuck downstairs. Though it’d been hard for them to follow Fundy originally, it didn’t take him more than a few minutes to find his way to the common room, snatch one of the medkits the Ski Patrol had brought, and continue outside. Now free of the oppressive air of the house, Wilbur started sprinting through the thick snow as best he could. _Please, please, let him be okay._

As he ran, he could almost hear the wind saying his name. A desperate call from Fundy or his own guilty conscience, he wasn’t sure. He wasn’t even sure that he wasn’t imagining it.

Wilbur arrived at Fundy’s point of impact with just as much desperation as he’d reached Sapnap’s. At first glance, he looked alright, even if he wasn’t moving. Wilbur didn’t trust that assessment, though. He’d seen Fundy fall from the third story roof with his own eyes; there was no telling what had happened beforehand.

One hand opening the medkit, Wilbur used the other to hold his walkie-talkie to his mouth. “Techno, I made it to Fundy.”

“I see you.”

“I can’t see anything right now, but he’s not moving.”

“Copy.”

Wilbur finally turned Fundy over. He gasped at the sight before him, though really, he should have been fully numb to it by now.

Where Fundy had been resting was a thick patch of deep maroon. It was much more concentrated than the one that had stemmed from Sapnap, less spread out. On Fundy’s back was the source of all the blood: a deep stab wound to his back, one that cut across from his left side to his spine. It looked deep, too. Wilbur could clearly make out white bits of bone and torn sinew.

God, he wanted to throw up. He couldn’t, though. He had a job to do. “Techno, it’s bad.”

The response came immediately. “How bad?”

“I can see bone.”

“Okay so really bad.”

“I’m – I’m gonna start checking to see if he’s even still alive. Can – can you just – talk to me?”

As Wilbur flipped Fundy back over, blood staining his hands from the unstaunched flow, he pressed the walkie-talkie between his ear and shoulder to keep Techno’s running commentary within earshot. He was rambling on about the surprisingly steep climb to the roof, Fundy’s skill in managing to scale it so quickly, and then the sheer nothingness that was up there. “I don’t know how he did it, man.”

Wilbur, though, was stuck on just what he’d discovered in his examination. Holding his hand over Fundy’s mouth brought no sensation of gentle breaths. He couldn’t feel a pulse, either. Just to be sure, Wilbur checked the stab wound again.

This time, no longer so distracted by shock and horror, Wilbur spotted the biggest issue. There, still yet slightly warm, was Fundy’s heart, just barely visible in the middle of the slice. And there was a massive cut in it.

Wilbur pressed his button a couple of times, trying to signal to Techno that he had something to say. He ignored the blood getting on the pristine pink kid’s toy.

“What’s up, Wil?”

“Tech, he’s dead. It hit his heart.”

Techno cursed softly, his radio just barely picking it up. “And I’ve got no leads up here, I have no idea where this man went! Why are there so many access points to the roof? Who designed this place?”

“Any sign of the radio?”

“No! It’s gone! MIA!”

Wilbur took a moment to just _feel_. God, it was painful to have hope snatched so suddenly from his fingertips. They’d been so joyful when Fundy had ingeniously improvised that radio, even with the reminders of their dead families all around them. Relief was a heady drug, after all.

But the high was over now, and Wilbur had been forced to sober up fast. Because now their last remaining guide was gone, they didn’t have any way to call for help, and it was only Wilbur and Techno against Dream.

Wilbur wasn’t sure if they had a proper chance anymore.

“-bur? Wilbur? Wil? You there?”

Suddenly snapping back to reality, Wilbur clicked his button and responded. “Yeah, yeah, Tech. Sorry, just…lost in thought.”

“We’ll figure this out, Wil. I mean, there was a snowmobile somewhere. We could get that to work, just make a break for it and hope we’re going the right way.”

“No, no, yeah, I know. It’s just us now, isn’t it, Techno?”

“Just us.”

“Phil and Tommy are gone, and Tubbo, and Niki, and everybody else. Fourteen down to three. And one of those three is a fucking psycho. Why did this happen, Techno? Why?”

“I don’t – I don’t know, Wil. It’s stupid and it just sucks and I don’t know what we’re supposed to do here.”

This time, though, as Wilbur went to press his button to respond, probably with some sort of platitude or something, Techno reopened his line of transmission. Apparently, he wasn’t done talking.

Except, he didn’t talk. Instead, his end stayed silent, only sending faint white noise, until Wilbur managed to pick out sounds of footsteps crunching on snow. They were slow, deliberate, like the person they belonged to was very carefully moving from heel to toe. They were also quiet. It was a terrible soundtrack to the dread pooling in Wilbur’s gut.

“Techno? What’s going on?” Wilbur tried to signal to let him speak, pressing his button rapidly, but Techno’s line remained open and constant. “Come on, Techno, you gotta give me something here.”

The footsteps transitioned to more of a shuffling sound, an additional noise of movement coming from far closer to the microphone.

Through the slight distortion of the radio, Wilbur heard Techno say, “What? Wil?” There was a clear edge of confusion and anxiety in his voice, something Wilbur wasn’t used to. Was Techno okay? Had his meds finally worn off? Was he talking to Wilbur, or someone else?

Even knowing it was useless, Wilbur jammed the button down again, shouting, “I’m here, Techno! I’m right here! What’s happening? Are you okay?”

Uselessness like he’d never felt before flooded through him. Was this his lot? Forced to sit down here and listen as his brother was in danger? Wilbur raced back towards the house, the radio held up to his ear all the while. This was his own form of torture, he was sure.

For a few tense seconds, that sentence was all Wilbur heard. Then, the snow crunching noises started up again, faster, more chaotically. _What was happening?_

“Techno!” he yelled.

To his surprise, he got a response. Or, well, not a response. But a sentence from Techno: “I don’t want to do this.”

“Do what, Techno? You don’t want to do what?” For a second, Wilbur was tempted to throw the cheap plastic walkie-talkie to the ground and watch it shatter. He refrained, though. This dumb hunk of plastic was all he had to know what was happening to his brother.

There was the muffled sound of another voice – or, at least, Wilbur thought there was. It was distant, crackly, barely different than the noises of moving snow. Techno’s next words, though, were painfully clear.

“No, no, please, I don’t want to do this, don’t make me do this.”

It wasn’t quite shouted, but it was delivered with such a note of pleading and pain that Wilbur almost felt physically hurt by it. He pumped his legs faster.

The radio never strayed from his ear.

_Come on, come on, faster, please, go!_

A grunt.

A thud.

The line went dead.

“Fuck!” Wilbur yelled. He stopped his desperate sprint to press his call button frantically. “Techno! Techno! Please, Techno, I need confirmation that you’re okay!” He released his button for a moment, waiting for a return transmission.

That moment may just have been the single most painful moment of his life.

There was no response.

“Techno!”

Nothing.

“Tech! Please!”

Absolute silence. The other walkie-talkie may as well have been dead.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck.” Wilbur resumed his breakneck pace, climbing the stairs three at a time just to get to the bedroom he’d left behind. He sprinted past the door, out onto the balcony, and slammed into the railing with all his momentum.

Wilbur winced, feeling places bruises would no doubt pop up, but pressed on. He clambered onto the railing, pulling himself onto the rooftop above him. The angle of it was far too steep for it to be safe, but Wilbur didn’t care. _That was his brother at stake!_

He scaled the roof like it was its own mountain, desperate to summit. Never ceasing despite the burning in his arms. Never faltering despite the iron taste in his throat.

When Wilbur finally reached the peak, he screamed, the sound catching in the snowy air around him. There was no satisfying echo, just pure blank silence.

Wilbur really hated silence.

He couldn’t see Techno anywhere. He’d been up here, Wilbur was sure, but the man was currently gone.

Terrified eyes searched the pristine white roof, trying to find any hint or clue. _Please, he just wanted his brother to be okay!_

There!

In the distance, a sign. Not one of hope, but one of possibility.

Once again, another trail of red.

Wilbur gulped, his heart heavy in his chest, and slid down the roof to follow it.

It was blood, no doubt about it. Wilbur had become far too familiar with the liquid to miss it.

It was also far too thick for comfort.

The trail, accompanied by marks of dragging, led to a hatch in the roof. _Techno had been saying that he’d seen other access points, hadn’t he?_

Without hesitation, Wilbur flipped it open. It led to a short staircase spiraling downward back into the main body of the house. Though he exited on the third floor he’d seldom visited, Wilbur didn’t have any trouble navigating.

The thick path, a twisted version of a yellow brick road, ensured that he wouldn’t miss a thing.

Wilbur was rapidly losing hope.

Still, he followed it.

He wasn’t sure whether he should be sprinting or sneaking, caught up in the many possibilities he could face. He ended up running down each hall, then pausing at the turns and peeking around the corners. Throughout all of it, the trail remained consistently thick. Wilbur didn’t want to think about how much blood that meant Techno had lost.

Twists and turns, a consistent descent, until Wilbur was back in familiar territory. He followed the trail past the common room – _always the common room_ – and down to the kitchen, where it suddenly turned sharply and led into the pantry.

 _Fuck_.

Wilbur passed the spot Karl had died, to what he hoped wouldn’t be the spot his brother would meet a similar end.

The pantry was empty.

However, the trapdoor leading down to the root cellar was askew.

Wilbur hunched over and heaved, managing to slowly shift the trapdoor up and open. It slammed down with a deep _thud_.

He took a single steadying breath, praying to whatever deity might be listening, before descending the equally red-stained stairs.

Before all of this had started, the cellar had been empty. Just a little room, chillier than the others, with a few bits of food on the mostly barren shelves.

Somehow, in the time Wilbur had left it untouched, it had transformed into some kind of sick ritual room or something.

Because, across the room from where Wilbur had entered, blood completely soaking his white shirt and clumping his hair, rips all over his clothes, completely limp, Techno hung chained to the cellar wall. Blood pooled at his feet.

Wilbur whimpered, his breath coming in shaky gasps. Wilbur Soot was alone. His family was gone.

And the only possible culprit, the only other one still alive, was standing in front of his brother’s body.

He pulled that damned smiley-face mask from his face, his expression stone-cold.

Dream.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It really is a Greek tragedy, isn't it?


	16. penultimate

“So it was you?”

Both men, the only two left of the party that had arrived in the mansion, spoke the damning accusation in unison.

Wilbur’s blood ran cold. He stared Dream down in his harsh green eyes. “Oh, you have the _audacity_ to say that to me, motherfucker? After everything you’ve done?”

“You’re one to talk, aren’t you?”

“Don’t try your three hundred IQ reverse psychology on me, Dream. It’s so obvious! We should have known it all along! With how happy you were to throw Eret out?”

“I seem to recall someone else in this room being particularly preachy about throwing him out. Unless you want to question my memory as well as my sanity?”

“Oh, for once I’m not questioning anything, Dream.”

“I’m certainly questioning your intelligence at thinking this sort of move will work on me.”

“Says the man who killed his best friends.”

“Coming from the man who killed his brothers.”

“You keep doing this, Dream!” Wilbur threw his hands in the air, frustrated. “It’s only us left! Own up to what you’ve done!”

“I won’t own up to someone else’s crimes!”

Wilbur sighed. This conversation was going nowhere. “Fuck – I – just, before you kill me, can I at least see my brother?”

Dream stepped to the side, waving his arm in a grandiose gesture of sarcasm. He left bloody shoeprints in his wake. “Be my guest, Soot. Don’t know why you’d need to look, unless you want to celebrate your victory, but sure. Why not.”

“Oh, I’m _so_ glad I have your blessing.” Still, Wilbur wasn’t about to pass up this opportunity while it lasted. He quickly moved to his brother’s side. He raised his shaky, bloodstained hands to gently touch Techno’s shirt. It was that feather-soft touch that solidified the loss to him.

From barely pressing Techno’s shirt to suddenly grabbing onto his brother without any regard for blood, Wilbur finally started sobbing in earnest.

Techno was still warm, but he was cooling fast. The ever-present chill of the cellar certainly was doing its job, robbing Wilbur’s brother of the heat he’d had in life. Wilbur laid his head on his chest, just like they would do when they were kids and Wilbur would lay on top of his brother. The pain multiplied when the reliable, deep _thump-thump_ of Techno’s heart was absent.

“Oh, finally feeling some pain for your sins, Soot? Or is this just a little show for the sake of your audience?”

The body was leaking blood from what felt like everywhere, as covered in sharp slices as it was. The fabric of Techno’s clothing merged with the edges of his wounds, creating an environment that would have certainly been a pain to fix had Techno still had any chance of living. But his state was worse than Bad’s had been, in Wilbur’s opinion. Not just because he was his brother, but because Techno’s cuts looked far more purposeful than Bad’s had been.

Bad had been stabbed over and over in the torso.

Techno seemed more like he’d been cut all over his body in precise fashion. As if to bleed him dry.

The massive pool at his feet and Techno’s unnatural paleness certainly seemed to support this theory.

“I wouldn’t expect someone like you to understand, Dream,” Wilbur retorted, his voice tight. He lifted his head slightly to stare Dream down, though he refused to let Techno go. He could feel bits of partially dried blood on his cheek as his face twisted in grief-fueled fury. “After all, you hardly shed a tear when we told you Sapnap was gone. And from what George told me, the two of you grew up together. Though I suppose I can’t trust George’s word on that, either, seeing as you took him apart like a set of fucking Legos!”

“Cry all you want, Soot. I know what you’ve done.” Dream’s voice lacked any sort of pity or remorse. It was like the cellar they were in: cold, hard, unforgiving, deadly.

“What I’ve done?” Wilbur stood to his full height. Though he was reluctant to let the last of his family go, if he wasn’t careful, the whole of their family would be left in this horrific mansion. “What _I’ve_ done? Do you think I could do this to my own brother, Dream?”

“The blood suits you, Wilbur. Matches the blood on your hands when you walked in.”

“This?” Wilbur raised his hands to show Dream the fresh coat of red covering the layer that had already been there. “This came from trying to save Fundy. Not like you’d know what that’s like. You only know how to take lives, not save them.”

“Cute that you’d think I’d believe that.”

The two men started to slowly circle each other in the dim, cramped space the cellar provided. A show of dominance and aggression and tension coiled before being set free in an explosive burst. Like a pair of wolves moments before battling it out with teeth bared and claws sharpened, they paced.

It was oddly graceful for all its malicious intent. Somehow Wilbur and Dream’s steps synced up until they moved in such perfect unison it was like they’d choreographed it beforehand. There was an aura of deadliness in their dance, though. It showed in the tension in Dream’s shoulders. It showed in the subtle hunch of Wilbur’s back. It showed in the flexing of their fingers.

It showed in the bloody footprints that marked Dream’s steady path.

It showed in the deep maroon of Wilbur’s blood-soaked hands.

And as Wilbur kept circling, kept following Dream’s moves and stepping in those same stained footprints he’d left, he couldn’t help but feel furious about all the lives lost.

“You are a cruel, despicable excuse for a human being,” he spat. “You kill innocents, _children_ , and your own friends! And you still refuse to own up to it!”

“I will own up to _nothing_ when I’m innocent!” Dream retorted, his expression equally angry. “Your own _brothers_? What kind of psychopath does that? And you keep trying to just – _push_ the blame onto me like your own guilty conscience, if you even _have_ one, is refusing to let you accept it! Just say it! Say that you killed them!”

“What kind of fucked up bullshit are you trying to pull? _I_ killed them? Really? Tell me, Dream, what were their last words? What did Sapnap say when you shot him off the roof? What was George’s reaction as you butchered him? Were they shocked? Or did they know you were a traitorous rat bastard all along?”

“How dare-”

“Ooh, I know!” Wilbur felt a maddened smile stretch across his face, some sort of twisted dark humor pulling him onwards. “They were in on it, weren’t they? They helped you out with all the dirty work, and then when the work was done, you went and betrayed them? I’ve got it, don’t I, Dream? They’re just as bad as y-”

Without another word, Dream shoved Wilbur, breaking their tense standoff. Fueled by whatever anger he was feeling, at being caught out or some fucked up defense of his friends, Dream pushed with enough force that Wilbur flew backward. He crashed into one of the shelves, cold potatoes tumbling down around him.

But rather than stopping as he hit the stone wall behind the cellar, Wilbur kept going.

He landed behind the walls.

A deep, dark tunnel continued behind him.

For a moment, Wilbur forgot his animosity. Enthralled by the discovery, he slowly, sorely got to his feet, bits of the wooden shelf sliding off his shoulders as he did. “What the…”

Dream echoed his surprise. “How did we miss this?”

He was caught in a dilemma. Sure, Dream was right there, the man who’d killed a dozen people in cold blood, but on the other hand, Wilbur still needed to get out alive. He _wanted_ to live. And this tunnel might be the key to escaping.

In the end, that basic human desire to survive won out. He sighed. “Truce?”

Dream stretched his hand out. “Truce.”

They shook their hands in what may have been the grimmest business exchange Wilbur had ever taken part in. The slightly sweaty, very bloody slide of hand on hand felt like Wilbur was selling his soul to the devil. For all he knew, he might be. But at the bare minimum, he just signed a deal with a murderer.

God, he hated what necessity drove him to.

With Dream at his side, the atmosphere almost unbearably tense, Wilbur started moving down the tunnel. Did he feel good having Dream at his back? No. But there wasn’t exactly the space in the cold, dank passageway.

They were cramped together in the thin tunnel. Wilbur had never been one to be claustrophobic, but the walls definitely felt like they were closing in around him. Had the ceiling always been that low? Had his shoulders always been so wide?

The mansion was certainly getting to him.

The tunnel began a slow but steady incline. Wilbur could feel it in the angle of his feet, the chill in the walls that decreased ever so slightly. He eyed Dream over his shoulder, just a quick glance, but continued onwards.

It leveled out after they’d gone up a little bit, though Wilbur wasn’t sure how far up. He spotted a faint glimpse of light, dim against the wall. He held his hand up in front of it.

For a moment, he just looked at it, faintly grey against his bloodstained skin. It was oddly entrancing to watch, he thought as he waved his hand back and forth. He curled his fingers to form grotesque shapes against the light, and, for a split second, he felt like he just might be the guilty one. He couldn’t take his eyes off the illuminated blood that coated his hands. Small flecks flaked away as he stared, tiny pinpricks of red that cast miniscule shadows of their own. There was blood on his hands, that he couldn’t deny. But was it from saving Fundy, like he’d thought? Or had he blocked out something terrible he’d done?

Dream’s imperious tap on his shoulder shook him free of his meandering thoughts. No, no, he couldn’t let his mind get to him like that. It was Dream who’d done it. Dream was the one who’d killed his family, Dream was the one who’d killed the children, Dream was the one who’d killed his own friends.

It wasn’t Wilbur.

He dusted his hands off, doing his best now to ignore the fluttering bits of blood. Instead, he focused on the light itself. It was coming from a tiny peephole in the wall, a pinprick so small that Wilbur wasn’t surprised they couldn’t see it from the outside. Because that’s where it led: outside.

As Wilbur peered through it, he could see a hallway he’d traversed one too many times. It was the one between the kitchen and the common room, pointed directly at the room they’d found Eret in.

The door, from his small vantage point, was ajar. The room inside was still dark and dim. The mattress, though, was half-dragged into the hallway. Wilbur certainly didn’t remember it being like that the last time he was in that hall, not too long ago.

More and more things kept confusing him.

He moved past them.

Dream peeked through momentarily, Wilbur letting him have his turn, before turning to Wilbur. He raised one eyebrow high, crossing his arms. “So that’s a big trick you had under your sleeve, wasn’t it? What other secrets have you been hiding?”

Wilbur huffed and turned away. He was fed up with the useless back-and-forth. If Dream wouldn’t admit, that was fine. Wilbur knew the truth. That was what counted.

He forged onwards, continuing down the path ahead of him. He didn’t have to go too much further before he reached a gap in the wall, a step up from the level they walked. This time, before he got time to investigate, Dream shoved him aside.

The hoodie-clad man pushed on the exposed wooden stud, half-rotted away. It swung open into the hall, allowing Dream to poke his head through. Wilbur followed behind. It was a painting that they emerged from, its thickly painted canvas creating the perfect cover.

A secret doorway to a secret tunnel.

“So this is how you did it, huh?” Dream asked.

“Like you’re one to talk, asshole.”

“That’s the lightest of terms I could use to describe you.”

Wilbur snorted despite himself. He leaned back, and Dream swung the painting back into place.

Without any further ado, they continued down the tunnel. It remained just as dark as before, restarting its incline, though there were occasional spots of light leading to peepholes, just like the one Wilbur had found before. There were other hidden doors, too. A trapdoor leading down to another level of the tunnel that Wilbur didn’t even want to check out, a tiny door in the ceiling of the hallway, and, finally, a trapdoor leading upwards with a small ladder hanging from it.

The tunnel ended there.

A thick wall of stone and a rickety ladder that barely looked like it would hold his weight.

Wilbur gulped.

It felt like anticipation. It felt like inevitability. It felt like freedom.

It felt like an ending.

He breathed in, steadying himself, and climbed the ladder.

He pushed the door upwards.

There was a small rustling noise as papers slid off the top of the door.

Wilbur and Dream emerged in a room he didn’t recognize. On one wall was a panel of wood, a stark contrast to the stone of the other walls, but that quickly fell to the wayside as they took in the rest of the room.

There was a mural of maps plastered to the stone, creating a crazed collage. Wilbur traced the faintly faded lines. Someone had been here. They’d run their hands over these maps, leeching pigment from the poor papers.

Other walls had sections of papers pinned up, though these were patchwork and sparse. A stack of books rested in one corner; Wilbur could see a few atlases, a phone book, and several travel guides.

His eyes were drawn to a backpack sitting against the wall, one that was uncannily familiar. It looked just like his own backpack.

In fact, as he looked closer and spotted the small commemorative coin stashed in the side pocket, he realized it _was_ his backpack.

“What the fuck is this, Dream?”

“I feel like I should be the one asking that question.”

As Dream split away to investigate the walls, Wilbur opened up his stolen bag.

Inside it, rather than his own things, were journals. Many of them. They were all worn and well-used, pages yellowed or loosening from their bindings. Packed in among them were loose papers. Wilbur grabbed them and shuffled through them.

A few folded pages ripped from the phone book that advertised a variety of job agencies, along with the DVLA.

Outdated travel guides for London, Brighton, and Newcastle.

Pages of ramblings he could barely decipher, all of them with telltale marks along the top that showed they had once been stuck to the wall.

There were still bits and pieces of his belongings mixed in with whatever Wilbur had discovered.

His wallet and ID, for example. Or his box of matches. Or his lucky guitar pick.

As Wilbur kept rummaging through it, a yearning pit of dread opened inside his chest. He held his wallet in one hand, a handful of papers in the other. He glanced back and forth between them.

This was all so confusing and frightening. Wilbur didn’t know what was going on anymore. What did it all mean? What kind of dastardly, devious thing was meant to come of stealing his backpack? For that matter, why steal his, instead of one belonging to someone already dead?

Like a thread being cut, Wilbur felt his fate being sealed.

He wasn’t meant to get out of this alive. It wouldn’t matter that this was his bag, not when everyone was dead.

Wilbur wasn’t sure if he wanted to fight, flee, or simply accept his looming demise. He couldn’t beat Dream, right? Really, he’d seen how Dream had flipped over them when he first ran from the group, he couldn’t beat that. Wilbur didn’t have Phil’s steady strength or Techno’s unparalleled skill. He was just a tall, lanky musician. It was over for him. He could feel it.

He turned to face Dream, though whether to beg for his life or offer his neck, he wasn’t sure.

Before he could get a single word out, though, he saw something that made the blood chill in his veins. His insides now as cold as the freezing outside, he watched in despair and alarm as Dream, whose eyes were on papers in his hands that he’d removed from the wall, facing towards Wilbur, was lit from behind.

The wood paneling they’d dismissed as they’d entered the room was gone, turned to the side. Grey light filtered through the wide opening, catching on the dust particles floating through the air.

And a figure stepped through.

Wilbur thought he could reach out in time. He thought he could shout loud enough and fast enough. He thought that maybe, just maybe, he could be wrong.

But it was too late.

The figure stepped closer, looming over Dream.

And in one fell swoop, they cleaved Dream’s head from his shoulders.

As Dream’s body collapsed to the floor like a puppet whose strings had been cut, his head flying to the side and smacking brutally into the wall before plopping onto the stone floor, the figure continued forward.

And then he heard a voice, so intrinsically familiar and yet so horrifically wrong and alien. It was a perspective he’d never heard before; one he’d never thought he’d have to hear. The voice, sending shivers down his spine with its tonal oddity and eerie closeness, said, simply and neutrally, sinisterly friendly, “Hello, Wilbur.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :))))


	17. Curtain Call

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here it is, my friends. The moment you've all been waiting for.

As the man discarded the long sword, blood dripping down the stoic blade, Wilbur was shocked to find that he was the only one left standing, in more ways than one. The steel hit the stone floor with a loud clatter, but Wilbur wasn’t paying attention to that. He was far too focused on the man standing in front of him as casually as he would waiting in line for a coffee. Not like what one would imagine someone would stand like right after mercilessly beheading a man.

He walked forward with an easy, loping stride, stepping over Dream’s collapsed body with the same disregard one would have going over a pile of laundry. He was tall, a few inches taller than Dream when his head was still attached. His hair, though slightly greasy and matted, was still somewhat fluffy looking. It was noticeably shorter than Wilbur’s, though. And it looked darker, too.

He was thinner than Wil, he noticed as the other man paced around him with a satisfied smirk on his face. It was the kind of thin that came with eating just barely too little for far too long. It was somewhat hard to tell through the man’s simple button-up and rumpled blazer, but the thin line of his neck and the hint of sunkenness to his eyes belied his otherwise unassuming appearance. If Wilbur were anybody else in any other situation, he would have thought that this was just another man walking down the street.

But it wasn’t.

But he wasn’t.

But Wilbur was still Wilbur, in a house full of bodies, staring at a picture-perfect replica of himself with a gleam of madness in his eyes.

The other Wilbur stopped his keen-eyed examination as he returned to standing in front of Wilbur, rocking back and forth on his heels for a moment. He gazed intently at the horrified look on Wilbur’s face. “A bit of a shock, isn’t it?”

Wilbur didn’t respond. How was he supposed to respond? What was the protocol for a situation like this? When a man who looks just like you kills your entire family, plus a score of others, what are you supposed to do?

When several tense seconds passed without a reply, the impostor pouted exaggeratedly. “Come on, Wilbur, can’t I get a better reaction from you? A little zing, something fiery and fun? Really, your kid brother was more fun to play with than you’re being.”

That was when Wil zeroed in on the bruised knuckles of the hands flying through the air and the yellow-purple smear beneath the other Wilbur’s eye. The impostor clocked Wilbur’s attention shift immediately.

He chuckled. “Oh, you like it? A nice parting gift from that brother of yours. Feisty little one, isn’t he?”

“Don’t talk about my brother like that.”

“Oh, is that what it takes to get a reaction out of you?”

“You killed him, you bastard!” Spit flew from Wilbur’s mouth with the depths of his rage. How dare this – this _copycat_ speak about his brother like that? Like he hadn’t been the one to kill him himself? Wilbur could see the evidence of his crime right there, written across his fists, as clear to both of them as a billboard. Wilbur seethed.

He would have stepped forward right then, ready to scramble for the sword to stab the impostor – whoever he was – right in the space where his curdled, blackened heart should have been, but the lookalike swooped down and grabbed it first, holding it like it was an extension of his arm. It rested comfortably in the air, the other Wilbur’s arm not trembling in the slightest, aimed right in the center of Wilbur’s – the real Wilbur – chest. Right where Wilbur planned to aim it at the other.

Wilbur froze.

Despite the fact that he was holding a weapon – one with wet blood still running down the channel in the center of the blade – the copycat laughed. It was a deep, hoarse, throaty laugh. It sounded as though he hadn’t laughed properly in ages. As though he’d forgotten how to.

The sword didn’t waver.

“Really, Wilbur, you think you’ve made a great discovery. Oh, you found me! Oh, whatever shall I do?” He held his free hand to his forehead in a parody of fainting. Blood smeared on his face. He dropped it, now deadly serious. “But I’ve planned for this, Wilbur. I’ve _planned_ for far too long to let this go to waste.” He tapped on his head, a sharp and aggressive movement as he stepped closer. “He thought he could get rid of me! He thought he could chain me down and hide me away and _ruin_ me! But I was better!” The copy now looked to the ceiling, addressing the unforgiving sky. “I’m better than you, you hear me! Yeah, I _bet_ you do! You’ve got ears everywhere!”

Wilbur was confused now. Of course he’d imagined that the person willing to ruthlessly slaughter thirteen people – maybe fourteen – would be a little unhinged, but this seemed too far. What was he talking about? Who was this man, and who was the ‘he’ he referred to?

The other man’s attention refocused on Wilbur, the sword now flicking up towards his throat. Wilbur gulped uncomfortably. “He ruined my life, Wilbur. A few words tossed to the right ears and suddenly I’m tossed into the wind like a piece of trash. I had to come out here – out here! – because this is the only place he wouldn’t be able to find me. Cut myself off entirely. Even from my passions, Wilbur! All I wanted was the same job, one that _I_ was better at! And he decides that that’s a cardinal sin that cannot be forgiven.”

That did nothing to clear things up. Wilbur raised a tentative hand, a single finger pointed, and opened his mouth, but the impostor cut him off before he could speak.

“He found it. Found the _one thing_ that could ruin everything I’ve worked for and he held it above my head. You’re a smart man, Wilbur, you know the story of Damocles. This is the sword held above my head. But I’m smarter than Damocles ever was.” His eyes were wide, far too wide to appear sane. “I didn’t sit there and wait for my end to come. I left. I left them _all_ behind and went where he couldn’t find me. Even if it was cold, and lonely, and hungry, and cut off from the world. I _refuse_ to let him beat me.”

“Who is _he_?” Wilbur finally shouted, at the end of his rope. “He this and him that, _who are you talking about_?”

The double tilted his head as though he was surprised that Wilbur didn’t know. As if it were just preposterous that he didn’t know already. Then, his eyes widening even further, a harsh sound escaped from his mouth. He spat the word like it was a curse. “ _Kai_.”

“Kai?”

“KAI!” the copy shouted, still with that same inflection, as if the name left a foul taste in his mouth. “It was him! He did this to me! It’s his fault that I’m out here!”

He spun, finally facing away from Wilbur and giving him a break from the sword caressing his neck. “He thought he could get rid of me forever, that he’d be fine, that he’d be _safe_ , so long as he had his nice little leverage. But what better way to escape that leverage than remove the fulcrum? After all,” he turned back to Wilbur, now running one elegant finger along the blade’s edge, “if I was no longer _me_ , then his little ploy doesn’t work, now does it? If I simply cease to be _Damocles_ , and become someone else, then the sword is no longer pointed to me. It’s so simple!”

“And then _you_ walked in the door.”

The sword swooped back towards Wilbur, all with a graceful flick of the impostor’s wrist. “Do you know the odds of meeting your doppelgänger in your lifetime? Because it’s somewhere in the realm of one in one _trillion_. So you can imagine my surprise when, mixed in with a whole party of strangers, was you! A neat little match that solves all my problems!”

“So your solution was murder,” Wilbur hissed.

“So, my solution was to find a nice and neat little way to pull a switcheroo! Normally, people don’t really make it this far out, and if they do, they certainly don’t stay as long as you all have. Poor Bad, it really was a case of wrong place, wrong time. But, you know, a little bit of quick finagling, a hint of misdirection, and he was willing to walk all the way to the room you all found him in. A real lamb to the slaughter. And it all just kind of went on from there!”

Wilbur felt inches from vomiting. This – this was his doppelgänger? Another him? Could he – was this other him really so capable of such a despicable act? Was _he_ capable of this sort of thing?

He had played a big role in getting Eret thrown out. He’d just – he’d been so _sure_ that it was him! It couldn’t have been anybody else! Or, that’s what he’d thought at the time.

But now his creeping, insidious mind was whispering to him. _Didn’t it feel good?_ it seemed to say. _Didn’t you feel_ powerful _when you had him at your mercy?_

 _Shut up,_ he whispered back. _I’m nothing like this monster._

_You already share a face. Who’s to say you aren’t alike on a more fundamental level, too?_

“You’re vile,” Wilbur murmured.

“Aw, don’t be like that,” the doppelgänger simpered. “It wasn’t the plan when I started! But, well. I started thinking about all the ways this could go wrong and what would happen if any of you got out and spread the word or what if your family could tell the difference and catch me and then I’d be right back where I started and Bad was already dead so really it was already too late to go back so I may as well complete the set and I was just. I wanted what you had! So badly! You have a life, and a family, and a future! And I’m essentially a nobody. My dream was taken from me. My future was taken. My name doesn’t even matter anymore. You have everything I lost! And I wanted it back, Wilbur.”

He stepped closer until he was nose-to-nose with Wilbur.

Their eyes met, completely even in height.

Their noses, the same shape, straight and long, just barely brushed against each other.

The doppelgänger smiled, a quirk of the mouth that Wilbur recognized from the mirror every morning. He hadn’t smiled like that in a while.

Wilbur could feel his warm breath ghost against his face when he spoke, an intimate whisper that felt so instinctually wrong in this moment. Dream’s corpse was still bleeding, forgotten behind them.

Every inhale felt like heresy as Wilbur stood, still frozen. “I want it. So now I’m _taking_ it.”

And then the sword that Wilbur had forgotten about in his moment frozen in time was swinging up, and the intricate hilt clattered against his head.

Everything went black.

When Wilbur woke, he was moving.

Not in the standard way of standing up and moving your legs to perambulate, no.

He was being dragged, his feet catching every divot in the floorboards and knocking loudly on the wooden floor.

Already that was a big difference compared to the stone floor of the small room he last remembered being in. Where was he-

Ah. He remembered now.

He was the last one left.

And his arms were currently pulled painfully above his head by a serial killer intent on stealing his identity.

Splendid.

For a moment, he thought about struggling, but the harsh pounding in his head, beating in time with his heart, prevented him from doing so. So did the ropes around his hands. It wasn’t worth it at this point. If he tried to fight now, he’d be dead in moments. Better to let it play out and see what would happen. Hopefully.

As Wilbur blearily adjusted to his dim surroundings, he found that he recognized where they were. Out of the tunnel, a floor down, just outside the common room. In fact, this was the hallway Wilbur had originally taken to get to the living room those few days ago, back when he still had a family and hope for his future existence. It was all gone now, even though he was right back where he’d started this nightmare.

“I see you’re awake,” the other Wilbur said amicably. His voice held no hint of malice, no hint of his terrible intentions. It was friendly, as if this were as simple as asking for the weather, and that was what scared Wilbur the most. This man had killed thirteen living, breathing people, and it didn’t bother him one bit. “Have a nice nap?”

“Fuck you,” Wilbur shot back groggily.

“I really must thank you for being such an excellent listener back there. It felt quite good – I haven’t been able to do that in ages. Not much company out here, I’m sure you’ve noticed.”

“Like anyone would want to hang around with you.”

“Hmmm,” his doppelgänger mused, trailing off. Their steady drag carried on in silence. Wilbur didn’t know what words to use to fill the silence. What would the correct conversation starter here be? I hate you, you’re a monster, go fuck yourself? I’m afraid that we’re too similar and that I might be like you? What did you even do in the first place to have to hide out here?

Yeah, none of that was going to work particularly well. Wilbur consigned himself to the quiet, the silence only punctuated by the steady funeral march of his limp legs.

The pair turned around a corner, Wilbur having to turn his legs awkwardly to fit through the doorway into the common room, and then they were there. In the place where the original group had all come together, and where Wilbur very well might meet his end. It was poetic, he thought grimly, in a twisted sort of way. The end of one Wilbur and the beginning of a new one, here in this room where Wilbur’s life had changed forever. Fitting. He huffed.

His doppelgänger pulled Wilbur all the way to the front of the fireplace, where a pile of bricks and a grey-stained bucket sat waiting.

Wilbur wasn’t sure where this is going. All he knew was that he didn’t like its direction.

He was dropped unceremoniously to the ground, his head colliding with the floor painfully. His headache reignited itself. Wilbur groaned.

“Now, Wilbur. You’ve been quite the help through all of this. I do appreciate it. But I do need to make sure that I properly cover my trail. Don’t want him finding me and all, you understand, of course. Of course you do! So I’m going to take a page out of the book of a real inspiration of mine. Do you know Poe? You seem a civilized fellow, I feel like you’d know. You caught my nice little Shakespeare reference with your brother, after all. Do you know the story of the Cask of Amontillado?”

Wilbur did know that story. Though he nodded his head in answer, internally all he could think was _no no no no nonononono_. He knew that story very well. And he knew how it ended.

With a man locked in a wall, sentenced to suffocate as he used up the oxygen when all he’d wanted was a glass of wine from a friend. And though Wilbur didn’t consider the man looming over him with a smile on his face a friend, not in the slightest, he felt like he was rapidly becoming closer to poor Fortunato.

The space beneath the hearth of the fireplace was looking awfully well-prepared.

“In the spirit of the story, and in thanks for all you’ve done for me, I’ll leave you a little gift. A gift! A nice bottle of wine. It may not be an amontillado, but hey! A nice shiraz will be nice, I think. Your thoughts?”

Wilbur couldn’t move. He was too busy staring at the shadows under the hearth that seemed to beckon him. It was ironic that the space inches from a fire would be so dark, and yet here he was, feeling inevitably pulled ever closer like it was a black hole.

“I’ll take that as your agreement. Well, um. Ooh, this is awkward. I’m going to have to tie you down there – do you mind?”

Limp as putty, Wilbur let himself be pushed into place beneath the hearth. The pounding in his head, the ringing in his ears, the beating in his chest, the cold of the house, the grief of his loss, and the comforting darkness all came together and left Wilbur glued in place.

It harkened back to childhood memories of hiding from the monsters by going under his bed, because it was safe there, because he could see everything that was coming his way yet they couldn’t see him, because he was the one in control of the situation.

Now that feeling had been perverted into this, what would be his coffin and grave all in one.

Wilbur let it happen.

The double tied the rope around Wilbur’s wrists to a ring secured in the back wall. Wilbur could move his legs, but that wouldn’t be enough to help him escape.

His doppelgänger placed the bottle of wine next to his head, like that would help anything.

And then he reached into the bucket, pulled out a trowel covered in mortar, slathered it across a brick, and slotted it into place at the junction between fireplace and floor.

And thus Wilbur’s end began.

As he tried his best to stave off the numbness of his impending doom, his double kept bricking him in, never stopping, never pausing, never taking a single break. He simply kept going, robotic in his ceaselessness yet with a grace that belied his humanity – or, at least, in a physical sense. The neutral focus on his face as he kept at his task, coupled with gentle humming, well. That was something no person with a heart would do as they sentenced another human being to a slow, asphyxiating death.

The walls closed in around Wilbur.

Literally.

Then, with only a single little spot remaining, a thin shaft of barely-there light the only thing reaching Wilbur, his doppelgänger finally addressed him again. “Thank you so much for this, Wilbur. I know you probably hate me, but you’ve saved me. I’ll see you on the other side.”

And then he slid the last brick into place.

Plunged into pure, endless darkness, Wilbur’s world shrunk to the tiny space he was encased in and the single bottle of wine meant to get him through it.

His work now completed, Will patted the top of the hearth and used it to lever himself upwards.

He’d done it. He’d put all the pieces where they belonged, and now he was back in control. His life was his once more, even if technically it was someone else’s. Whoever it belonged to, he had the freedom to live it as he pleased, and that was what counted.

God, it was freeing.

He grabbed the items he’d prepared: a thick jacket of his own, a stolen pair of boots, the original Wilbur’s backpack that he’d already packed, and the keys to the snowmobiles the Ski Patrollers had ridden up here. It was odd, holding so little in his hands, yet knowing they would have so much impact on his life. He twirled the keys on his finger. He held his freedom in his grasp, and yet it barely weighed anything.

Oh, it was wonderful.

He waltzed to the front door of this godforsaken mansion. He wouldn’t be sad to see it go, to say the least. He wanted out, escape, freedom. And now it was finally here. He’d dreamed about this for so long, and it was finally here.

Oh, it was euphoric. He felt as though he could do anything.

The door was behind him.

He stood on the porch and gave the mansion one final look. Even if he’d hated the necessity, it’d been his refuge for ages.

But his need for sanctuary was gone.

With a laugh bubbling from his lungs, Will strode into the thick snow.

The clouds parted and the sun shone between them. Its bright rays made the snow sparkle in a thousand glittery beads. It was fitting, Will thought. The day he left, and the storm that had trapped his escape let up.

“Thank you!” he called to the sky.

He continued wading through the thick blanket of snow, reveling in the feeling of moisture seeping into his pant legs. A shame the boots he wore were so short, and his pants were only simple slacks, not meant for the weather.

He didn’t care.

He was free.

He whooped for joy, a noise that echoed through the otherwise silent clearing. “I’ve done it! I’m free!” He laughed once more.

Unable to contain himself, he started sprinting through the snow as best he could, delighting in every stumble and near-fall, all the way to the pair of lumps that showed where the snowmobiles were buried.

He dug them out, practically singing all the while, and hopped into the seat of the first one. To his delight, this one wasn’t the one that he’d heard the Ski Patrol complain about – it still worked fine. The engine started up with a loud grumble, and a few choppy lunges forward as the machine worked its way out of its divot and to the surface of the powder.

Will was soaked, even his top jacket unable to keep out the freezing cold water, but it didn’t matter. The chill started seeping into his bones, coursing through his veins as ice settled on his skin and the wind buffeted his face. He hadn’t been able to feel warm in so very long, trapped in a prison of a sanctuary with nothing but the cold for company on the nights that he wished he could feel anything. He’d forgotten what warmth felt like. Now, though, it didn’t matter. The cold had transformed from a lonely reminder to a constant companion that strengthened his resolve. It was evolving yet again. The sharp scent of pine and the spikes of cold pricked at his nose, and they lanced through his mind and his heart, and it felt like satisfaction, like freedom.

As he swooped between pine trees, accelerating down the mountain and towards the civilization he hadn’t seen in so long, he felt cold, so cold.

He knew he could never feel warm again, not when the cold had woven itself so thoroughly into his being.

And with the mansion behind him, evidence of his crimes left for the mountain to take, Will – no, _Wilbur_ smiled.

He was so cold.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "There's no more clues, in this video. Nothing else. You won't find any new facts, any new tidbits. In fact, your um, community, as you call it, in your discord that they've made, uh, have gathered most of what they need.  
> The last step is for you to figure out the story. That's the last thing."
> 
> "And this whole thing can come to a nice clean end with a little bow on the top. It's nice when things end with a bow on the top, isn't it, Jack?   
> It's nice when things end with a bow on the top."


	18. The Bow Unravels

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Due to unforeseen circumstances, I am now missing a beta. If anybody knows someone, or is available themselves, please let me know. The position will stay unfilled until a suitable replacement can be found.

Somewhere in the wilderness, hidden in the depths of a wintry forest upon a snow-coated mountain, sits a mansion. Not a house, for this bestial, gloomy building is far too large to be demeaned to a simple house. Nor is it a home, for there is nobody in the world who would call it such.

One man is fleeing it as fast as he can, desperate to escape its grasping clutches. He has lain within its walls for far too long now, and he longs for the outside world like the earth longs for the sun each night. This building has never been a home to him, solely a refuge he forever resents. A birdcage he placed himself in that he escapes at the first moment he can. Never a house, never a home.

Inside it is the trail of bodies he is leaving behind.

Two lay outside the mansion under mounds of snow, waiting for the springtime sun to unearth them. Their hastily cobbled-together graves won’t last, not when the only cover they have is crystallized water. It makes for an elegant grave, in theory, if not for the dirt stains that litter the snow and turn its gleaming white a muddled beige. There is no beauty in their final resting places. Nothing new can grow over them in the winter, and by the time the spring comes, they will be revealed to the blind sky. The world doesn’t care about these two men, both innocent victims led astray by a man wearing the face of a friend.

They will sit beneath the snow, and they will stay exactly as they are. One with a myriad of deep gouges across his bloody chest, the other with an eternal ring of purple around his limp neck. Neither to be disturbed until the sun caresses the forest with its loving warmth once more.

They will sit beneath the snow until the spring comes, and then they will rot.

Seven lay in the partially disintegrated sunroom, accumulating dust beneath their makeshift shrouds. Like the furniture they’d uncovered when they first arrived in the building, they can only be distinguished by the peaks and crevasses of their figures. Pair that with the large wine-red stains that stiffen the sheets on half of them, and the sunroom stands as an eerie tribute. The plants wither to dust and nothingness, and so too do the people left behind.

Of those lucky enough to have gotten a memorial, the passing of the seasons will scarcely impede these seven’s decomposition. Time will trawl ever onwards, as it always must, and they will sink to nothing but bones and oblivion.

The eldest, betrayed by the duplicate of his brother, left as a cruel imitation of the work of the Great Bard.

The pair to the first sacrifice, whose throat may no longer be distended by riches, but whose lips stay blue and eyes lifeless.

The poor exile, the betrayed and not the betrayer, eternally marked by winter’s greedy fingers and another one’s greedy blows.

The girl who only wanted to help, whose last moments were spent in shock and fear and a hot slice of pain upon her neck, her precious lifeblood adhering her shroud to her throat.

The man who just missed his friend and used his dying strength to try to warn the others; the arrow is no longer embedded in his chest, but the deep maroon still marks his final resting place just as it marked the snow where he’d died.

And the children, twinned best friends, their hands still entwined even in the stillness of death. Just as they’d held each other as they died, the others hadn’t had the heart to separate them after.

All of them will be left here while the distant sun beats down on their sheet-covered bodies, and they will have nobody to find them, and so here they shall remain until eternity breathes its last breath.

And then there are the stragglers.

The poor souls who’d been caught in the final breathless hunt, each surrounded by fear and paranoia and the dwindling numbers. The ones who were never laid to rest, and never will be.

The strewn odds and ends of viscera and entrails, hidden in the secret nooks and crannies of the building. Though some few pieces were found by friends and grieved over accordingly, those parts were nowhere near enough to put the puzzle back together. The rest stay in their hiding spots, secret alcoves and stealthy tunnels and rooms that were never discovered. In their smaller size comes a quicker end, and soon enough the rats will return to eat whatever mush is left.

The patrolman left forever in the snow he tried to save others from. With a knife wound in the back and the snow tossed about by the final rescue attempt, he lays otherwise undisturbed in his point of impact. Though no more snow falls to cover him up, to even attempt at a modest grave, he is still far more peaceful than the others who never receive a funeral.

The regal one hangs from his chains, his blood no longer dripping from his paper-white body. The scarlet pool beneath him is congealed, and in the chill of the cellar, it is inches from freezing entirely. What a sight that would be, to see a man the same color as the snow hanging above all his blood. A gruesome mirror, eternally reflecting his red-tinted figure to unseeing eyes.

And finally, the one they thought was a mastermind to the end. Trapped behind a bookshelf that will never turn about again, he lays on the ice-cold floor, his exposed neck dripping a steady faucet of blood downwards. His head, separated as it is, stares unseeingly back at his body. Whether he retained enough consciousness in those final seconds to see his own body fall to the ground and understand his fate will remain a mystery. What is certain is the limpness of his every limb and the ragged edge on one side of his severed neck, where the blade that did the deed lost its leverage and the skin tore instead of cut.

This is not their home. This is their graveyard.

But wait, that is only the unlucky thirteen.

Where is the final lost soul to complete the company?

Well, far away from the others, in what could perhaps be called the center of the mansion, rests a stately fireplace. It is tall, and proud, and its stone framework climbs up the wall and reaches toward the ceiling. It is empty, now. There is no wood to fill it and light the room with heady fire. Instead, it is blackened and dead, a monument to the people who reveled in its warmth for the brief period they could.

The house is silent.

Except, if you were to stand by this grand fireplace, maybe to look at the empty frames, maybe to refill the wood basket, maybe to gaze out the large windows and ponder what once was, you might be able to hear something.

It is quiet, a faint but steady noise.

But it is there.

It has been there for several hours now.

_Scrape. Scrape. Scrape._

There, do you hear it?

_Scrape. Scrape. Scrape._

That right there.

_Scrape. Scrape. Scrape._

Slow, painfully so, but never ceasing, is the sound of determination.

Because the fourteenth person who entered the mansion that day is not joining the rest in the peaceful slumber of death.

He is sitting in the dark, gritting his teeth as he grips a shard of glass wrapped in a shred of his shirt with blood-slick fingers, and he is digging away at the barely wet mortar that seals him in his tomb. Deeper and deeper he digs, until his knuckles brush at the rough surface of the bricks and tear themselves bloody, and even then, he keeps going.

He barely breathes.

There’s only so much oxygen left for him.

His sole focus is removing just one brick, just one that would let the air in and settle the hourglass counting down to his demise.

He digs, and he digs, and he digs.

And after so long, after he loses feeling in his hand and cramps wrack through his back and he nearly succumbs to the call of death, he pushes on the brick, and it shifts.

He pushes harder.

The brick slides forward and falls to the floor in front of the hearth with a clatter.

And Wilbur Soot, the man who refused to die, sticks his hand through the hole and feels the air outside his coffin, and _breathes_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It has now been four months since I started this fic; more, even. I have spent ages planning and plotting and writing everything out to take this one random idea I had and turn it into a reality. I can't quite believe that it's coming to an end, and I certainly can't believe that so many of you stuck around through my crazy idea and cryptic smiley faces and random clues.  
> All I can say to you in response is, from the bottom of my heart, thank you. Thank you for reading, leaving kudos, bookmarking, commenting, whatever you did. Thank you for being here, and thank you for giving me a chance.  
> So, for the last time to all of you:
> 
> :))))


	19. An Invitation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Not a chapter, but an invitation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> An invitation has arrived at your doorstep. 
> 
> How do you respond?

https://discord.gg/ffHv8FB6Pq

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I look forward to your response.

**Author's Note:**

> :))))
> 
> Feel free to do communal sleuthing in the comments...
> 
> I'll be watching :))))


End file.
